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Author: Lalita Kaplish

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Lalita Kaplish

Lalita Kaplish is Web Editor at the Wellcome Library. You can also find her on LinkedIn and Twitter @LalitaKaplish.

  • ‘Small bite, big threat’

    07/04/2014

    World Health Day 2014 (7 April) is about raising awareness of vector borne diseases – diseases carried by mosquitos, flies, ticks and bugs. In the 1980s the Wellcome Trust Film Unit produced a series of films about the history of… Continue reading

  • An anti-social habit and the ‘War on Tuberculosis’

    24/03/2014

    Tuberculosis has been called the social disease. It has lived with mankind for thousands of years, and our view of the disease has changed with time and social context. On World Tuberculosis Day (24 March), here’s an example of how… Continue reading

  • The rights to reproduction

    08/03/2014

    To mark International Women’s Day on 8 March, here’s a 50 year old greeting from the archives that has some mystery about it. This card was sent to Carlos Paton Blacker (1895-1975): The reverse of the card says: “Warmest greetings… Continue reading

  • Evolving images of Darwinism

    21/02/2014

    An old favourite from the Library collections, The Evolution of Household Articles has been digitised. We’ve used some of its quirky images on the blog before, and now it’s available for everyone to enjoy, in glorious detail, in our player.… Continue reading

  • Uncovering a scientific life in the archives

    19/02/2014

    Leslie Barnett (1920-2002)  was a microbiologist who worked with some of the top geneticists of the 20th century to help discover important advances in gene structure and function. Born in London as Margaret Leslie Collard she began her career in agriculture with… Continue reading

  • Happy Valentine’s Day

    14/02/2014

    It’s amazing what you can find in a history of medicine library: The Valentine’s Day card, probably from the 1920s, doesn’t hold back on the ‘hearts and flowers’ (and cherubs) when it’s opened: This and several other Valantine’s Day cards… Continue reading

  • Diagnosing diabetes: a wee taste of honey

    14/11/2013

    On World Diabetes Day (14th November), our attention is often drawn to the rise of the disease today or the 20th-century discovery of insulin as a treatment. However, the earliest reference to diabetes possibly goes back as far as 1500BCE in… Continue reading

  • Seeing the world through invisible glasses

    19/08/2013

    Why, Miss Smith, without your glasses you’re beautiful! (…. as Miss Smith removes her spectacles and shakes down her hair….) Be-spectacled librarians and archivists are only too well aware that the wearing of glasses carries all sorts of cultural baggage… Continue reading

  • Tuberculosis: A Short History – a new exhibition

    14/06/2013

    Tuberculosis (TB) has long been regarded as a major danger to public health, and is now widely seen as a disease that is not only endemic across the world, but also one that has developed new strains that threaten to… Continue reading

  • St Lucia

    Sun, Sea and Snails

    26/04/2013

    The island of St. Lucia: palm-fringed beaches bathed in glorious Caribbean sun and rugged volcanic mountains separated by valleys of lush, tropical vegetation – the perfect destination for that special romantic get-away, perhaps?  In the 1960s, however, a group of… Continue reading