Blood and Justice

The 17th Century Parisian doctor who made blood transfusionhistory... In 1667 a Parisian doctor by the name of Jean-Baptiste Denisperformed an operation that had never previously been attempted -he transfused blood into another human being. This was the firstattempt at a procedure that over subsequent centuries was to savethe lives of thousands of people. But at the time Denis was nearlyconvicted of murder. The victim of Denis's experiment was a middle-aged man sufferingfrom mad rages. Denis believed that by transfusing the blood of acalf into the man the man would assume the placid nature of thecalf. The experiment appeared to work. The highly toxic blood madethe man in question very ill and therefore very placid. It is nowbelieved that the man was in fact suffering from syphilis, whichinduced his violent behaviour. The symptoms of the syphilis wouldalso have been relieved by the high fever that the toxic bloodwould have induced. Encouraged by this apparent success, though unaware of the reasonsfor it, many other people attempted similar experiments. Eventually the man died and Denis was arrested for his murder.Further investigations revealed however that the man had not infact died from the blood transfusion (although he certainly wouldhave done so very shortly) but from cyanide placed in his food byhis wife. Giving an insight into the first attempts at a procedure that hasgone on to be developed for the benefit of humanity, and into thesymbolism of blood throughout the history of medicine, Blood andJustice raises ethical issues that are as relevant today as theywere at the time.