Lena Stern, a Jewish woman scientist, has been awarded the Gold Medal in recognition of her discovery of what Soviet doctors term “the Elixir of Life,” it was announced today.
The discovery of the Soviet-Jewish woman who is a member of the Moscow Academy of Science, brings back to life within a few minutes people killed by shock Tetanus and shock have always reaped a huge harvest of human life upon the battlefield. A state of shock occurs usually in cases of severe contusions and burns.
Experimenting upon shock in animals, Lena Stern ascertained that action of one and the same substance may have entirely different effects, depending upon the path by which it is injected into the organism. It may have a marked depressing effect if it reaches the general circulation system, and a marked excitatory effect when injected directly into the nourishing medium of the brain.
Illustrating the success of her experiments, Miss Stern injected a dose of tetanus bacilli into her own dog to whom she is very much attached. The animal lay stretched out without any visible sign of life. To all intents and purposes it was dead. Precise measuring instruments showed that the blood-pressure had fallen below the point which separates life from death. But Stern injected into the lateral ventricle of the brain an anti-tetanus serum which when injected into the general circulatory system produces, rather than alleviates shock and immediately the symptoms of shock began to disappear and the dog recovered consciousness and was alive and well as if nothing had happened.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
