Hélène Sparrow (5 June 1891 – 13 November 1970), was a Polish

medical doctor A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the study, diagnosis, prognosis ...

and

bacteriologist A bacteriologist is a microbiologist, or similarly trained professional, in bacteriology— a subdivision of microbiology that studies bacteria, typically Pathogenic bacteria, pathogenic ones. Bacteriologists are interested in studying and learnin ...

. She is best known for her work on the control of many epidemics including:

typhoid fever Typhoid fever, also known simply as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella enterica'' serotype Typhi bacteria, also called ''Salmonella'' Typhi. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often th ...

cholera Cholera () is an infection of the small intestine by some Strain (biology), strains of the Bacteria, bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea last ...

dysentery Dysentery ( , ), historically known as the bloody flux, is a type of gastroenteritis that results in bloody diarrhea. Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. Complications may include dehyd ...

, and

smallpox Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by Variola virus (often called Smallpox virus), which belongs to the genus '' Orthopoxvirus''. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (W ...

."Hélène Sparrow-Germa M.D." The British Medical Journal 1, no. 5739 (1971): 54. Accessed March 15, 2021. . Throughout the 1920s, Sparrow worked with the

Polish Armed Forces The Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland (, ; abbreviated SZ RP), also called the Polish Armed Forces and popularly called in Poland (, roughly "the Polish Military"—abbreviated ''WP''), are the national Military, armed forces of the Poland, ...

at the State Institute of Hygiene in Warsaw. While at the State Institute of Hygiene, she worked vigilantly to produce the first vaccine against

typhus Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposu ...

and ran several large-scale vaccination campaigns to control the spread of

diphtheria Diphtheria is an infection caused by the bacteria, bacterium ''Corynebacterium diphtheriae''. Most infections are asymptomatic or have a mild Course (medicine), clinical course, but in some outbreaks, the mortality rate approaches 10%. Signs a ...

and

scarlet fever Scarlet fever, also known as scarlatina, is an infectious disease caused by ''Streptococcus pyogenes'', a Group A streptococcus (GAS). It most commonly affects children between five and 15 years of age. The signs and symptoms include a sore ...

all along the eastern frontiers of

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. In 1933, Sparrow began to study flea-borne and louse-borne

rickettsia ''Rickettsia'' is a genus of nonmotile, gram-negative, nonspore-forming, highly pleomorphic bacteria that may occur in the forms of cocci (0.1 μm in diameter), bacilli (1–4 μm long), or threads (up to about 10 μm long). The genus was n ...

diseases in

Tunis Tunis (, ') is the capital city, capital and largest city of Tunisia. The greater metropolitan area of Tunis, often referred to as "Grand Tunis", has about 2,700,000 inhabitants. , it is the third-largest city in the Maghreb region (after Casabl ...

, where she became the head of her own department at the

Pasteur Institute The Pasteur Institute (, ) is a French non-profit private foundation dedicated to the study of biology, micro-organisms, diseases, and vaccines. It is named after Louis Pasteur, who invented pasteurization and vaccines for anthrax and rabies. Th ...

. In her later years, she expanded her studies to include

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

and

Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...

. While in Mexico and Guatemala, Sparrow developed a protective vaccine against typhus. She contributed a great amount of research to the

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...

on relapsing fever specifically in

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

Early life

Sparrow was born on 5 June 1891 in

Bohuslav Bohuslav (, ; ) is a List of cities in Ukraine, city on the Ros (river), Ros River in Obukhiv Raion, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine. It hosts the administration of Bohuslav urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. Population: 17,135 (2001). It is ...

Kiev Governorate Kiev Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit ('' guberniya'') of the Russian Empire (1796–1917), Ukrainian People's Republic (1917–18; 1918–1921), Ukrainian State (1918), and the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (1919–19 ...

. Her parents married in 1890. Her mother was X. Stefanska (b. c 1870) and her father Leopold Sparrow (born c. 1860) was a magistrate of English origin. She was educated at a secondary school in Kiev, gaining a gold medal and then attended the Faculty of Medicine in Kiev, obtaining a medical diploma (cum laude) in 1915. She obtained a second degree in medicine from University of Poznań in 1923. She obtained her doctorate in 1928 from the University of Warsaw.

Academic career

In 1915 she became involved in the control of epidemic disease within the Russian army during the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. Once fighting ended, she began working in clinics in Dorpat (now

Tartu Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 97,759 (as of 2024). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of Riga, Latvia. Tartu lies on the Emajõgi river, which connects the ...

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

), supervised by Professor Bylina, soon moving to the Institute of Bacteriology in Kiev as an assistant to Wolodymyr Lindeman. She began to work on epidemic typhus with Oleksii Krontovski and L. Polev. In 1920 she went to

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

to work with Dr

Ludwik Rajchman Ludwik Witold Rajchman (; 1 November 1881 – 13 July 1965) was a Polish physician and bacteriologist. He is regarded as the founder of UNICEF, and served as its first chairman from 1946 to 1950. Early life and education Rajchman was born to Ale ...

, the Director of the State Institute of Hygiene. In 1922 she was appointed Chief of Service and then in 1928 became the Chief of the Preventative Vaccinations Service. This included organising vaccination campaigns and also investigation of

outbreaks. She obtained a second medical degree from University of Poznań in 1923. Between 1921 and 1933 she also worked with Rudolf Weigl at the University of Lwów on epidemic typhus. During this time she was involved in setting up four public health laboratories in eastern Poland to benefit people relocated following national boundary changes as well as supervising large-scale programmes of vaccination against diphtheria and scarlet fever in the Warsaw region, supported by Robert Debré. She obtained her first tenured academic post in 1928 as an associate professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the

University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw (, ) is a public university, public research university in Warsaw, Poland. Established on November 19, 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country, offering 37 different fields of study as well ...

, presenting her doctoral thesis on ''Problèmes de la vaccination contre le typhus exanthématique'' (''The problems of vaccinations against exanthematic typhus'') and was subsequently the Professor of Bacteriology. She managed microbiology training and actively participating in medical societies in Poland and the Warsaw branch of the French Société de biologie into the 1930s.

Pasteur Institute

In 1923 a grant from the

League of Nations The League of Nations (LN or LoN; , SdN) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Paris Peace ...

took her to

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

for the beginning of her lifelong involvement with the

. She studied

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

with Albert Calmette and Camille Guérin in

Lille Lille (, ; ; ; ; ) is a city in the northern part of France, within French Flanders. Positioned along the Deûle river, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Prefectures in F ...

, then worked with Jules Bordet in Brussels and also with

Amédée Borrel Amédée Marie Vincent Borrel (1 August 1867 – 14 September 1936) was a French physician and microbiologist born in Cazouls-lès-Béziers, Hérault. Biography Borrel studied natural sciences and medicine at the University of Montpellier, w ...

at the Institute of Health in Strasbourg. In 1924 she was again sent to France for training in microbiology at the Pasteur Institute and in the laboratory of Alexandre Besredka. There she met

Charles Nicolle Charles Jules Henri Nicolle (21 September 1866 – 28 February 1936) was a French bacteriologist who received the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his identification of lice as the transmitter of epidemic typhus. Family Nicolle was born to Aline Lo ...

during his annual conference on typhus, changing the course of her life. Sparrow and Nicolle began working together, with their main studies being focused on typhus, specifically the ways in which it spread and how to create a vaccine to limit the contagion. At the beginning of the 20th century, little was known about epidemic typhus. The only known facts about typhus was that it was a dangerous and deadly disease that spread rapidly amongst dense populations, with its principal factors for transmission being dirty clothing and overcrowding.Gross, Ludwik. "How Charles Nicolle of the Pasteur Institute Discovered That Epidemic Typhus Is Transmitted by Lice: Reminiscences from My Years at the Pasteur Institute in Paris." ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America'' 93, no. 20 (1996): 10539-0540. Accessed March 21, 2021. . In September 1909, Nicolle made the discovery that lice were the primary vectors for typhus. This discovery came after observing typhus patients in Tunis. Nicolle stated that patients infected others on the street as well as hospital personnel working with dirty laundry, but once patients were admitted to the hospital and given a hot bath and clean clothing, they ceased to be infectious. This observation led Nicolle to look closer at the

lice Louse (: lice) is the common name for any member of the infraorder Phthiraptera, which contains nearly 5,000 species of wingless parasitic insects. Phthiraptera was previously recognized as an order, until a 2021 genetic study determined th ...

, as these were suspected to be responsible for transmitting typhus. For three months, Nicolle tested his lice transmission theory in the laboratory by injecting an uninfected chimpanzee with blood from a patient infected with typhus and letting lice feed on this now infected host. After a couple of days, the lice were transferred to a healthy chimpanzee to allow them to feed on an uninfected host. The second chimpanzee soon contracted typhus, resulting in a positive correlation between lice and the transmission of typhus. The first step in the search for a

vector Vector most often refers to: * Euclidean vector, a quantity with a magnitude and a direction * Disease vector, an agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen into another living organism Vector may also refer to: Mathematics a ...

for transmission of typhus was complete, but there were many challenges ahead. Nicolle, Sparrow and others aimed to produce a vaccine. In 1925, the Pasteur Institute financed her research with Nicolle into epidemic typhus in

Tunisia Tunisia, officially the Republic of Tunisia, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It is bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Tunisia also shares m ...

. While searching for a vaccine against typhus, Nicolle and Sparrow encountered many obstacles. Initially, Nicolle and Sparrow mixed typhus bacilli with blood serum from recovered patients. This mixture aided in keeping Nicolle himself in good health, but unfortunately fell short when trying to cure patients who were already infected with typhus. In 1931, she was sent by the government, along with Charles Nicolle, to study epidemic typhus in

and

, where they administered their typhus serum to the public. In 1932, Sparrow and Nicolle turned their attention to the Weigl vaccine.Weindling, Paul. "Between Bacteriology and Virology: The Development of Typhus Vaccines Between the First and Second World Wars." History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 17, no. 1 (1995): 81-90. Accessed March 21, 2021. . Rudolf Weigl had developed a technique for a typhus vaccine that involved producing numerous infected lice and then grinding them to create a vaccine paste. After Nicolle's death in 1936, Sparrow continued her research into a typhus vaccine. With her previous experience of the Weigl vaccine, Sparrow began to work exclusively on vaccines cultured in the lungs of small mammals. This led to her 1935 research on

murine The Old World rats and mice, part of the subfamily Murinae in the family Muridae, comprise at least 519 species. Members of this subfamily are called murines. In terms of species richness, this subfamily is larger than all mammal families excep ...

viruses as a potential basis of an anti-typhoid vaccine. In 1940, Paul Durand and Sparrow teamed up and began work on new culturing methods for typhus ''rickettsiae''. It was through this partnership that they developed the Durand-Sparrow anti-typhoid vaccine. Sparrow also worked to culture the agent of spotted fever as a prelude to a vaccine against

Rocky Mountain spotted fever Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF) is a bacterial disease spread by ticks. It typically begins with a fever and headache, which is followed a few days later with the development of a rash. The rash is generally Petechial rash, made up of small s ...

."Paul Durand (1886-1960)". Archives de l'Institut Pasteur. Archived from the original on 29 August 2013. Retrieved 13 May 2014. Her transfer of expertise in the laboratory culture of lice was important for progress against typhus at the Pasteur Institute in Tunis. This included development of a vaccine, trials of insecticides and isolation of bacteria that were the causal agents of typhus and typhus-like fevers. She was allowed to continue working at the Pasteur Institute until 1961 as 'Chef de Service', beyond the compulsory retirement age and from 1949 was the Head of the

vaccine A vaccine is a biological Dosage form, preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious disease, infectious or cancer, malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verifi ...

service, immunizing against tuberculosis. From 1955 she was in charge of work on relapsing fever in

for the

Personal life

She married Baron Robert von Kuegelgen from Estonia in 1917, a surgeon in the Russian army, but they eventually separated. They had a daughter, Marie Bogna Seiler von Kugelgen. Sparrow became a French national in 1933. In October 1933 she married Phillippe Germa, an agriculturalist. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

she hosted French refugees (including

André Gide André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French writer and author whose writings spanned a wide variety of styles and topics. He was awarded the 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature. Gide's career ranged from his begi ...

) and Polish deserters in

. Gide arrived in December 1942 while it was occupied by German and Italian troops, remaining until May 1943 when French, British and American forces re-took the city and he was able to travel to Algiers. During this time he recorded in his journal that Sparrow was present at, or hosted, several lunch engagements for mutual friends within the French community. Gide also recounts how Sparrow narrowly escaped death during bombing raids. On 1 January 1943, while she was in the building, a bomb fell on the ground-floor apartment where Sparrow lodged with the Boutelleau family, but it did not explode. Five days later, on 6 January, bombs destroyed two adjacent houses. Sparrow and her second husband planted an orange orchard together in Soukra, near Tunis. During the final French withdrawal from Tunis, the couple left Tunisia to retire to Corsica. She died at Pietranera in Corsica in 1970.

Awards and honours

*Prize, Kraków Medical Academy, 1922 *Head of Laboratory, Institute of State Health, Warsaw 1922 *Head of Preventive Vaccination Service, Institute of State Health, Warsaw 1928 *Head of Laboratory, Institute Pasteur, Tunis 1933 *Head of Vaccination Service, Pasteur Institute, Tunis 1945 - 1961 *Elected member of the Société de Pathologie Exotique (French Society of Exotic Pathology) 1945

Selected publications

She was author or co-author of at least 103 scientific publications. Some of the most significant are: *Sparrow H. "Sur une souche de Rickettsia quintana isolee en Tunisie" ''Pathologia et Microbiologia'', Vol. 24 (1961) pp. 140 - *Heisch RB., Sparrow H., Harvey AE. "The behavior of ''Spirochaeta recurrentis'' Lebert in lice." ''Bulletin de la Société de pathologie exotique et de ses filiales'', Vol 53 (1960) pp. 140 – 143 *Sparrow, H. "Etude du foyer ethiopien de fievre recurrente (Study of the Ethiopian source of recurrent fever)" ''Bulletin of the World Health Organization'' Vol. 19, No. 2 (1958) pp. 673 – 710 *Sparrow H. "Emploi des ratons noveaunes pour entrien de ''Borrelia recurrentis''.(Use of newborn rats for maintenance of ''Borrelia recurrentis'')" ''Bulletin de la Société de pathologie exotique et de ses filiales'', Vol. 49 No. 4 (1956) pp. 630 - *Durand P., Sparrow H., "Pulmonary inoculation in typhic and spotty viruses" ''Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Seances de L'Acadamie des Sciences'', Vol. 210 (1940) pp. 420 – 422 *Nicolle C., Sparrow H., "Experiments on the river virus of Japan (Tsutsugamushi)." ''Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Seances de L'Acadamie des Sciences'', Vol. 199 pp. (1934) 1349 - 1351 *Nicolle C., Sparrow H., Conseil E. "Preventative vaccination of man against exanthematic typhus by use of small repeated virulent doses (the brain of guinea pig)." ''Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Seances de L'Acadamie des Sciences'', Vol. 184 (1927) pp. 859 – 861 *Sparrow H. "Immunization against scarlet fever with the aid of the scarlet fever toxoid" ''Comptes Rendus des Seances de la Societe de Biologie et de ses filiales'', Vol. 97 (1927) pp. 957 – 959

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sparrow, Helene 1891 births French women biologists People from Bohuslav Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv alumni Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań alumni University of Warsaw alumni Pasteur Institute 1970 deaths Academic staff of the University of Warsaw Polish biologists Polish women scientists 20th-century Russian biologists Naturalized citizens of France 20th-century French women scientists Polish women academics 20th-century French scientists 20th-century Polish scientists 20th-century Russian women scientists 20th-century Polish biologists