was allowed to emigrate to Switzerland and began his work at the University of Geneva.
In 1889 he joined Mechnikov and Louis Pasteur in Paris.
Anti-cholera vaccine
At the time, one of the five great cholera pandemics of the nineteenth century ravaged
Asia and Europe. Even though Robert Koch discovered Vibrio cholerae in 1883, the medical
science at that time didn’t consider it a sole cause of the disease. This view was supported
by experiments by several biologists, notably Jaime Ferran in Spain. Haffkine focused his
research on developing cholera vaccine and produced an attenuated form of the bacterium.
Risking his own life, on July 18, 1892, Haffkine performed the first human test on himself and
reported his findings on July 30 to the Biological Society. Even though his discovery caused
enthusiastic stir in the press, it wasn’t widely accepted by his senior colleagues, including both
Mechnikov and Pasteur, nor by European official medical establishment in France, Germany
and Russia. The scientist decided to move to India where hundreds of thousands died from
ongoing epidemics. At first, he was met with deep suspicion and survived an assassination
attempt by Islamic extremists but during the first year there (1893), he managed to vaccinate
about 25,000 volunteers, most of whom survived. After contracting malaria, Haffkine had to
return to France. In his August 1895 report to Royal College of Physicians in London about
the results of his Indian expedition, Haffkine dedicated his successes to Pasteur, who recently
died. In March 1896, against his doctor’s advice, Haffkine returned to India and performed
30,000 vaccinations in seven months.
Anti-plague vaccine
In October 1896, an epidemic of bubonic plague struck Bombay and the government
asked Haffkine to help. He embarked upon the development of a vaccine in a makeshift
laboratory in a corridor of Grant Medical College. In three months of persistent work
(one of his assistants got nervous breakdown, two others quit), a form for human trials
was ready and on January 10, 1897 Haffkine tested it on himself. After these results were
announced to the authorities, volunteers at the Byculla jail were inoculated and survived
the epidemics, while seven inmates of the control group died. Haffkine’s successes in
fighting the ongoing epidemics were undisputable, but some officials still insisted on old
methods based on sanitarianism: washing homes by firehose with lime, herding affected
and suspected persons in camps and hospitals, and restricting travel. Even though the
official Russia was still unsympathetic to his research, Haffkine’s Russian colleagues
doctors V.K. Vysokovich and D.K. Zabolotny visited him in Bombay and during the 1898
cholera outbreak in the Russian Empire, the vaccine called «лимфа Хавкина» («limfa
Havkina», Havkin’s lymph) saved thousands of lives across the empire. By the turn of the
century, the number of inoculees in India alone reached four millions and doctor Haffkine
was appointed the Director of the Plague Laboratory in Bombay
Connection with Zionism
In 1898, Haffkine approached Aga Khan III with an offer for Sultan Abdul Hamid
II to resettle Jews in Palestine, then a province of the Ottoman Empire: the effort «could
be progressively undertaken in the Holy Land», «the land would be obtained by purchase
269
from the Sultan’s subjects», «the capital was to be provided by wealthier members of the
Jewish community», but the plan was rejected.
Little Dreyfus affair
In 1902, nineteen Punjabi villagers (inoculated from the same bottle of vaccine) died
of tetanus. An inquiry commission indicted Haffkine, and he was relieved of his position
and returned to England. The report was unofficially known as «Little Dreyfus affair», as a
reminder of Haffkine’s Jewish background and religion. The Lister Institute reinvestigated
the claim and overruled the verdict: it was discovered that an assistant used a dirty bottle
cap without sterilizing it. In July 1907, a letter published in The Times, called the case
against Haffkine «distinctly disproven». It was signed by Ronald Ross (Nobel laureate,
malaria researcher), R.F.C. Leith (the founder of Birmingham Institute of Pathology),
William R. Smith (President of the Council of the Royal Institute of Public Health), and
Simon Flexner (Director of Laboratories at New York Rockefeller Institute), among other
medical dignitaries. This led to Haffkine’s acquittal.
Late years
Since Haffkine’s post in Bombay was already occupied, he moved to Calcutta and
worked there until his retirement in 1914. Professor Haffkine returned to France and later
moved to Lausanne, where he spent last years of his life. In his later years, Haffkine
returned to Orthodox Jewish practice. In 1916, he wrote A Plea for Orthodoxy. In this
article Haffkine advocated traditional religious observance and decried the lack of such
observance among «enlightened» Jews.
During his brief visit to the Soviet Union in 1927, he found drastic changes in the country
of his birth. In 1929 he established the Haffkine Foundation to foster Jewish education in the
Eastern Europe. Haffkine received numerous honors and awards. In commemoration of a
century after his birth, the Haffkine Park was planted in Israel in 1960s.
Sources
Edinger, Henry. The Lonely Odyssey of W.M.W. Haffkine, In Jewish Life Volume 41,
No. 2 (Spring 1974).
Waksman, Selman A.. The Brilliant and Tragic Life of W.M.W. Haffkine: Bacteriologist,
Rutgers University Press (1964).
[85] Вальдемар Мордехай Вульф Хавкін (15 березня 1860 р. Одеса, Росія
– 26 жовтня 1930 р. Лозанна, Швейцарія) був бактеріологом, який переважно
працював в Індії. Він був першим мікробіологом, який вивів та застосував
вакцини проти холери та бубонної чуми. Вчений випробовував вакцини на собі.
Лорд Йозеф Лістер назвав його «рятівником людства».
Ранні роки
Володимир Ааронович Хавкін, четвертий з п’яти дітей у сім’ї єврейського
шкільного вчителя в Одесі, що в Російській імперії, отримав освіту в Одесі,
Бердянську та Санкт-Петербурзі.
Певний час молодий Хавкін був членом «Народної Волі», але після того як
група почала тероризувати громадських службовців, він покинув революційний рух.