A leading Swiss doctor who gave up a distinguished career in his native country to devote his life to helping HIV/AIDS sufferers in Zimbabwe tonight was presented with the European of the Year 2007 Award by Reader’s Digest magazine. Dr. Ruedi Luthy, 65, received the award and 10,000 Swiss francs for his HIV/AIDS foundation from Switzerland’s Foreign Minister and next president, Micheline Calmy-Rey, at a packed and highly emotional ceremony in Zurich. (full text PRnewswire).
… Er war Professor an der Universität Zürich. Er hatte eine gutgehende Praxis. Und er war der bekannteste Fachmann für die Behandlung von Aids-Kranken in der Schweiz: Dr. Ruedi Lüthy. Im Jahr 2003 schloss er seine Praxis in Zürich und wagte mit 60 noch einmal einen Neuanfang … (full text SF1 1/2).
Reader’s Digest Honors Dr. Ruedi Luthy as the European of the Year 2007, Jan. 18, 2007, and same: Swiss Aids expert is European of the Year.
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Ruedi Luthy – Switzerland and Zimbabwe
Click first on the button for a swiss german/german/english spoken video of 25.00 min.!
Books he participates:
- Current Chemotherapy: Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of Chemotherapy, Zurich/Switzerland, 18-23 September 1977
by Walter Siegenthaler and Ruedi Luthy
Hardcover, American Society for Microbiology, ISBN 0914826166 (0-914826-16-6); - Challenges of the 1990’s, New Diseases and New Therapies: Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS): Merck Sharp and Dohme International, Medical Advisory Council, the Old Course Hotel St. Andrew’s Scotland, September 12 and 13, 1991, Vol. 199
by Ruedi Luthy, R. Gordon Douglas, Medical Advisory Council Merck, Sharp and Dohme Inte … (Barnes and Noble).
He says: « I HAD TO HELP – I could not bear sitting in y lovely home while hundreds die of Aids in Zimbabwe every day.” These were the thoughts of Professor Ruedi Lüthy, the eminent Swiss HIV and Aids specialist. In Africa AIDS is the cause of an imminent humanitarian disaster. A countless number of people are already infected with HIV, millions are dying of Aids and tragically millions of children have become orphans. It is time for us to reach out to help » … (DIVA international)
Detection of low copy numbers of HIV-1 proviral DNA in patient PBMCs by a high-input, sequence-capture PCR (Mega-PCR).
His preview profile on BiomedExperts, and: Latest papers.
He says also: « Samuel Gerber designed several excellent solutions for a clinic expansion for us under difficult economic and political circumstances (in Harare, Zimbabwe). His support on difficult legal and financial issues was highly professional. We are grateful to him for this superb achievement, which he donated to us without charge as a contribution to humanitarian assistance ». (Samuel Gerber.ch).
Dr. Luthy was Professor of Medicine and Infectious Diseases at Zurich University and chairman of Switzerland’s National AIDS Committee. Moved by the desperate plight of HIV/AIDS victims in crisis-torn Zimbabwe, where one in four adults is estimated to have the virus, Dr. Luthy set up the Connaught Clinic in Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital. He raised the start-up money himself, and with his wife Rosy moved to Harare in 2004 to run the clinic. Since then the clinic has treated more than 1,300 patients free of charge and is expanding its work. »Instead of bemoaning the ineffectiveness of governments in providing drugs and medical care, Dr. Luthy resolved to do something to help, » said Conrad Kiechel, Editorial Director of Reader’s Digest international editions. « It is this impassioned effort that, in just three years, has treated more than 1,300 Zimbabweans and achieved a survival rate of patients on antiretrovirals that is twice as successful as similar regimes in other parts of Southern Africa. » Bob Low, European Bureau Chief of Reader’s Digest, commented: « We are proud to honor Dr. Luthy’s devotion to the most vulnerable citizens of a country where HIV/AIDS has decimated the population and caused unimaginable hardship. » Between 1.7 million and 2.2 million Zimbabwean adults are infected with HIV/AIDS, according to the World Health Organization. (full text PRnewswire).
Find him and his publications on find articles; on Scientific Commons; on Google Scholar-search; on Google Blog-search, mainly on german speaking blogs.
More in german:
… Neuanfang in Zimbabwe: In Zimbabwe eröffnete er ein Ambulatorium und bildet Schwestern in der Therapie von HIV-Betroffenen aus. In Zimbabwe sind rund ein Drittel der Menschen HIV-positiv. AIDS zerstört das Land. Seit die Medikamente gegen Aids für die armen Länder Afrikas billiger geworden sind, gibt es auch hier Therapie-Möglichkeiten, allerdings fehlt das Know-how über die Anwendung. Diese will Ruedi Lüthy vermitteln. Kein leichtes Unterfangen, denn der Arzt aus der Schweiz kämpft im krisengeschüttelten Drittweltland Zimbabwe mit allen möglichen Hindernissen. (full text SF1 2/2).
Prof. Ruedi Lüthy und sein Team in Harare/Simbabwe.
… An guten Nachrichten mangelte es zumindest am Tag der Preisverleihung nicht. So hatte Lüthy kurz vor der Veranstaltung erfahren, dass das Welternährungsprogramm der UNO dem Projekt sechs Tonnen Mais zur Verfügung stellen wird. Den Menschen medizinisch zu helfen sein nämlich nur das eine, weshalb seine Stiftung vor einem Jahr begonnen habe, den oftmals Hunger leidenden Patientinnen und Patienten auch Nahrungsmittel zu verteilen. (Preisverleihung Uni Zürich).
Links and mentions in medical books and websites:
Institut für Sozial- und Präventivmedizin, Bern, with: The International Epidemiologic Databases to EvaluateAIDS, Southern Africa region (IeDEA-SA);
Comparative Multiple-Dose Pharmacokinetics of Cefotaxime, Moxalactam, and Ceftazidime;
The Journal of Infectious Diseases 2000;
AAC;
The Chinese Way to Healing: Many Paths to Wholeness;
Microbiological reviews: A Publication of the American Society for Microbiology;
The American Review of Respiratory Disease;
Predictors of unprotected sexual contacts in HIV-infected persons in Switzerland.