The state secretariat for cultural diplomacy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade plans a series of international thematic events to coincide with the Ignac Semmelweis memorial year announced by UNESCO for 2015, marking the 150th anniversary of his death, the ministry said on Thursday.
The events will be held with the involvement of embassies, foreign representative offices and the Balassi institute with the aim to promote Hungarian science, medical training, innovation and creativity around the world.
A working team has been set up by the ministry to coordinate the series and the team will comprise of invited representatives of the Ministry for Human Resources, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, the National Innovation Office, the Hungarian UNESCO Committee and Semmelweis University.
Described as the "savior of mothers", Semmelweis discovered in the mid-19th century that the incidence of childbed fever could be drastically cut by the use of hand disinfection in obstetrical clinics.
A collection of printed materials on his discovery published between 1847 and 1861 has been included in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register in 2013.