Joseph Barnes (14 November 1914 – 4 May 2017) was an Irish physician and medical missionary who worked in

leper colonies A leper colony, also known by many other names, is an isolated community for the quarantining and treatment of lepers, people suffering from leprosy. '' M. leprae'', the bacterium responsible for leprosy, is believed to have spread from East Af ...

West Africa West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Maurit ...

in the 1940s. There he worked with sisters from the Medical Missionaries of Mary including Sr Mary de Lourdes Gogan. Most notably, he co-founded International Community for the Relief of Suffering and Starvation (ICROSS) with

Michael Elmore-Meegan Thomas Michael Kevin Elmore-Meegan (born 26 March 1959, in Liverpool), also known as Michael Meegan or Mike Meegan, is a British-born Irish humanitarian and the founder of several charities and non-governmental organisations, specialising in an ...

. Born in

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

, Barnes was educated at

Synge Street CBS Synge Street CBS (colloquially Synger) is a boys' non-fee-paying state school, under the auspices of the Edmund Rice Schools Trust, located in the Dublin 8 area of Dublin, Ireland. The school was founded in 1864 by Canon ...

and

University College, Dublin University College Dublin (commonly referred to as UCD) ( ga, Coláiste na hOllscoile, Baile Átha Cliath) is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a collegiate university, member institution of the National University of Ireland ...

. He lectured in tropical medicine at the

Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland The Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) is a medical professional and educational institution, which is also known as RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Ireland's first private university. It was established in 1784 ...

. He became a

centenarian A centenarian is a person who has reached the age of 100 years. Because life expectancies worldwide are below 100 years, the term is invariably associated with longevity. In 2012, the United Nations estimated that there were 316,600 living cente ...

in November 2014, and died in 2017, aged 102.

References

External links

Profile
famousirishscientists.weebly.com; accessed 22 September 2017. 1914 births 2017 deaths Medical doctors from Belfast Christian medical missionaries 20th-century Irish medical doctors Irish centenarians Irish leprologists Men centenarians People educated at Synge Street CBS {{Ireland-scientist-stub