Abstract
In the history of Latin American social medicine, numerous works have presented a harmonious link between Rudolf Virchow, Max Westenhöfer, and Salvador Allende, which establishes the origin of ideas of Latin American social medicine in a prestigious European source, represented by Virchow. A key to that story is that Allende was a student of Westenhöfer, a disciple of Virchow who lived in Chile three times (1908-1911, 1929-1932, and 1948-1957). Based on primary sources and contextual data, this article problematizes the relationship between Allende and Westenhöfer, and questions the influence of Virchow in Chilean social medicine.
Highlights
En el marco de la historia de la medicina social latinoamericana, numerosos trabajos historiográficos han presentado un vínculo armónico entre Rudolf Virchow, Max Westenhöfer y Salvador Allende, afirmando una procedencia virtuosa de las ideas de la medicina social latinoamericana en una prestigiosa fuente europea, como es la que representa Virchow
The importance of Salvador Allende as a leading figure in Chilean social medicine is indisputable, for a variety of justifiable reasons: his participation in the well-known group of leftwing doctors who called themselves the Vanguardia Médica during the 1930s; the incisive analysis of his book La realidad médico-social chilena – a text published in 1939 during his term as minister of Health during the Popular Front government of 1939-1942 –; his persistent legislative activity to build a national health care system; and the progressive health policy he promoted during his term as president, representing the Popular Unity coalition between 1970 and 1973 (Illanes, 2010; Labra, 2004; Molina Bustos, 2010)
When Allende is portrayed as one of the protagonists of social medicine at an international level, it is often claimed that he was a student, and even a disciple, of Max Westenhöfer, a German scientist and professor at the Medical School of the University of Chile, who in turn was a student of Rudolf Virchow back in Germany
Summary
As mentioned in the introduction, the link between Virchow, Westenhöfer, and Allende has already become a kind of conventional wisdom in the historiography of Latin American social medicine. This story seems to originate in the work of Howard Waitzkin, an expert in, and passionate advocate of, Latin American social medicine. A master-disciple type of relationship is logically implicit in this statement, while in works that cite Waitzkin it becomes a concrete teacherstudent relationship (e.g., Porter, 2006, p.1668; Apráez Ippolito, 2010, p.4) In this context, Waitzkin’s biography and intellectual trajectory are of interest. Westenhöfer’s actions in Chile reveal clearly that he was an admirer and follower of Virchow’s clinical ideas and practices, but they say very little about his defense of Virchow’s political ideas, or a body of concepts clearly recognizable as “social medicine.” Westenhöfer later visited the country in 1938 as cultural ambassador of the Third Reich and departed from a defeated Germany in 1948, living in Chile from that date until his death in 1957 (Sievers Wicke, 1958, p.15-18)
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