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Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health logoLink to Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health
. 2006 Aug;60(8):671.

Virchow misquoted, part‐quoted, and the real McCoy

J R A (with acknowledgements to Siân Anis)
PMCID: PMC2588080

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Midweek programme on 22 February 2006, Jonathon Kaplan quoted Virchow as saying that, “pathology is politics writ large”. He seems to have been misquoting the usual part‐quotation that, “Medicine is a social science and politics is nothing but medicine writ large”. In fact, what Virchow really said was that, “Medicine is a social science and politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale. Medicine as a social science, as the science of human beings, has the obligation to point out problems and to attempt their theoretical solution; the politician, the practical anthropologist, must find the means for their actual solution”.1

References

  • 1.Friedlander E. Rudolf Virchow on pathology education. http://www.pathguy.com/virchow.htm

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