Samoilovych, Danylo

Samoilovych, Danylo [Самойлович, Данило; Samojlovyč; real name: Сушківський; Sushkivsky], b 22 December 1742 in Yanivka, Chernihiv regiment, d 4 March 1804 in Mykolaiv, Kherson gubernia. Physician and founder of epidemiology in Ukraine; member of 12 foreign academies of science. After completing his studies at the Kyivan Mohyla Academy (1756–61) and the Medico-Surgical School of the Saint Petersburg Military Hospital (1761–5) he served as chief physician of the Women’s Venereological Hospital and as official doctor of Konotop regiment. He studied abroad at Strassburg and Leiden (PH D, 1780) universities and then returned to Ukraine, where he assumed the posts of physician in chief for Katerynoslav vicegerency (1784–90), quarantine chief for Ukraine (1793–1800), and inspector for the Black Sea Medical Board (1800–4). He devoted over 30 years to the struggle against the plague in various parts of Ukraine. He showed that the disease is transmitted by contact with patients or infected objects and tried to isolate the infecting agent. He predicted the effectiveness of vaccination against the plague, which he tested on himself, and worked out a system of control methods. His selected works were published in Moscow in 1949–52.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Borodii, M. Danylo Samoilovych (Kyiv 1987)

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]