Corporate Body

Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine (1910 - 1930)

From
1 January 1910
Townsville, Queensland, Australia
To
4 March 1930
Functions
Medical Research
Reference No
552
Legal Status
Agency of the Commonwealth of Australia
Location
Townsville, Queensland

Summary

The Institute of Tropical Medicine was established in Townsville, Queensland, the first medical research institute in Australia and partly endowed by the Commonwealth Government. Anton Breinl arrived in Queensland in January 1910 as the Institute's inaugural director. Until the Institute's laboratory was opened in June 1913, Breinl undertook investigative tours (including to Papua New Guinea) to assess the most pressing problems to be addressed by the Institute. He determined that the research program would concentrate on mosquito-borne diseases, hookworm and filaria, and the physiology of living on the tropics. In 11 years the Institute produced 57 papers, almost half of which carried Breinl's name. The Institute (and Breinl) was subject, from its inception, to a relentless campaign from J. H. L. Cumpston, Director of Commonwealth Quarantine Medical Service, who wanted it in Sydney under his control as part of a Commonwealth Department of Health. After Breinl resigned in October 1920 the Institute became wholly subject to the Federal Government. In 1930 its functions were transferred to become the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at the University of Sydney. The Institute is sometimes stated to be the predecessor of the Australian Institute of Tropical Health and Medicine, which was established at the James Cook University in 2008.

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Timeline

 1910 - 1930 Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine
       1930 - 1980 School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine

Related People

Published resources

Book Sections

  • Douglas, Robert M., 'One Day in the Medical Life of Queensland: the Opening of the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine' in Pioneer Medicine in Australia, John Pearn, ed. (Brisbane: Amphion Press, 1988), pp. 135-143, 294. Details
  • Harloe, Lori, 'From North to South: the Translocation of the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine' in Pioneer Medicine in Australia, John Pearn, ed. (Brisbane: Amphion Press, 1988), pp. 144-158, 295-299. Details
  • Harloe, Lori, 'Anton Breinl and the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine' in Health and healing in tropical Australia and New Guinea, MacLeod, Roy and Denoon, Donald, eds (Townsville, Qld: James Cook University, 1991), pp. 34-46. Details

Journal Articles

  • Angus, B. M.; Cannon, L. G. R.; and Adlard, R. D., 'Parasitology and the Queensland Museum, with Biographical Notes on Collectors', Memoirs of the Queensland Museum: Nature, 53 (2007), 1-156. Details
  • Anon, 'The Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine', British medical journal, 1 (2568) (1910), 715-6. Details
  • Douglas, R. A., 'Dr Anton Breinl and the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine I(-III)', Medical Journal of Australia, 1 (1977), 713-6, 748-51, 784-90. Details
  • Parker, Andrew, 'A "Complete Protective Machinery" - Classification and Intervention Through the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine, 1911-1928', Health and History, 1 (2/3) (1999), 182-201. Details

Resources

Resource Sections

See also

  • Morison, Patricia, The Martin spirit: Charles Martin and the foundation of biological science in Australia (Canberra: Halstead Press, 2019), 296 pp. Details

Ailie Smith and Helen Cohn

Created: 2 May 2002, Last modified: 15 September 2022

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