Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 78-79. (Budapest, 1976)

KÖZLEMÉNYEK - ELŐADÁSOK - Buzinkay Géza: Közegészségügyünk és orvostársadalmunk a kiegyezés utáni élclapokban, 1867-1875

S u m m a r y After the Austro — Hungarian Compromise in 1867 comic papers played the role of political journals with special tone. Five of them spread widely and were appeared as long as years. They were featured by great many subjects (both writings and wits for drawing) sent in by the readers. From these journals therefore we can conclude to the readers', i.e. patients' thought of physician-patient contact. The material of these papers relating to medicine was manysided apart from definitly scientific matter that they were not interested in. The greatest part of the material relating to physicians and the number of anecdotes was significant, too. Public health conditions came up mainly because of the cholera epidemics in 1872/73. Comic papers made fun of both inhabitants using quackery and the impotence of physicians as well as of administration. Those papers drew a tint picture of Hungarian medical society. Reflections on homeopathy, violent discussions around it give us essential facts to connections between physicians and politics. Homeopathic doctors would have liked to win not on scientific territory but on a political one. They tried to take up posts by the aid of political factors. Leftwing parties supported homeopathic affairs and considered the establishment of the university chair of homeopathy (1870) as a feat of their own. Irrespective of party affiliation comic papers made fun of Itinerant Conferences of Hungarian Physicians and Naturalists. Those were not considered scientific events any longer but gorging in large number that was rarely broken by some uninteresting papers repeated year by year. Being the most developed strata in intelligentsia our medical society demonstrated the achievement of bourgeois status in Hungary as a model. The noble ideas of middle classes, hunting after coat-of-arms gave splended and frequent material for comic papers. It also occured that some physician strove after higher salary and at the same time after freeing himselve from unpleasant obligations. Comic papers were interested in apothecaries less than in physicians: they were considered as shopkeepers. G. BUZ1NKAY, M.A., Dr. phil. Head of Department of the Semmelweis Medical Historical Museum, Library and Archives, Editor of the Comm. Hist. Artis Med., Secretary of the Hungarian Society for the History of Medicine Semmelweis Orvostörténeti Könyvtár H-1023 Budapest, Török u. 12. Hungary