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Wide Opportunities for Service
Found by Medical Worker in China
Dr. Adele Cohn, '27, first American physician sent to
China by the American Bureau for Medical Aid to China,
chose that oriental land .'because millions of Chinese die
each year from tuberculosis just because there are not
enough doctors to help them, and few are trained in
tubercular work."
Dr. Cohn received her M.D. degree from the University
of Pennsylvania, and served as interne at Thomasville,
Georgia, and at Newark, New Jersey. She specialized in
tuberculosis therapy, and was staff physician at the Sea
View Hospital and at Montefiore Sanitorium; she was
chiefresident physician at Bedford Hills Sanitorium when
the opportunity to serve in China came. Her patients
expressed their appreciation of her work, and their regret
at her departure, by purchasing a $150 pneumothorax
apparatus for her.
She left for China in July, 1941, accompanied by "six
trunks ofmedical supplies and two suitcases ofclothing."
The trip from San Francisco to Hong Kong required two
months; she flew from Hong Kong to Chungking, and
with Dr. Robert K." S. Lim, director of the Chinese Red
Cross, her superior, traveled by automobile and rickshaw
to the mountain city of Kweiyang, in Kewichow Province.
In this city, 3,500 feet above sea level, is the fiftybed
sanitorium of which she is director.
The number of clinic visitors and patients has increased
so greatly that Dr. Cohn has been obliged to take over
many extra duties in addition to teaching modern
methods of tuberculosis treatment to native doctors. She
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DR. ADELE
COHN, '27
has started clinics in obstetrics and gynecology. There are
no interpreters, and she has had to begin the serious study
of the Chinese language-at the same time teaching
English to many of her staff.
The location of the hospital is such that it has been
quite free from Japanese air raids. Dr. Cohn saw little of
the actual fighting fronts during the trip.
"You would be disgusted with the filth and poverty,"
she writes. "So would I, if I hadn't been gradually prepared
for it at Manila and Hong Kong. There is a great
deal of suffering and very little complaining.
"Soldiers continue to pour in here from everywhere,
and it is pitiful to see them come in after walking ten or
twelve miles. They look like walking skeletons, clothed
in rags, and barefooted. Their bodies are usually covered
with infected sores. Some have swollen feet three times
their normal size, wrapped in paper or rags. Some are
unable to walk and are carried on the soldier's backs.
Many die along the road, and lie there until someone
takes them away. Most of them have dysentery and
malaria. A few of them have tuberculosis. All of them
are suffering from malnutrition."
The staff at the hospital has enough food but the prices
are exorbitant. White and sweet potatoes, noodles, and
spaghetti are common. Sugar is $13 a pound, coffee $6 a
pound, and bread is $5.50 a loaf!
Because of the outrageous food costs, Dr. Cohn is
boarding some of the doctors in her home, which she
built herself with the aid of the Chinese. She has become
accustomed to the highly seasoned Chinese food. At
Kweiyang "ping pong" isn't a game, but the first course
at dinner, consisting of cold cuts. She has been invited to
many dinner parties, and was surprised to learn that the
wives of the Chinese staffmembers are not included in the
invitation-possibly because the women know very little
English.
The China she has seen so far is made up of a few very
wealthy persons, a few of the middle class, and millions
living in poverty. She says, "they are amazing in their
persistence and endurance and their ability to get along
under all sorts of trying conditions."
There have been several calls for part-time secretarial
assistance at the Prince Street Campus this
fall. Young married alumnae who find that a small
apartment is not very time consuming and wives
and mothers whose husbands have gone into military
service are invited to get in touch with the
Placement Office.
ROCHESTER ALUMNI-ALUMNAE REVIEW