Breakthrough: Elizabeth Hughes, the Discovery of Insulin, and the Making of a Medical Miracle, by Thea Cooper and Arthur Ainsberg

 

People

Elizabeth Hughes Gossett Charles Evans Hughes – father, Supreme Court, Secretary of State for President Harding Antoinette – mother Siblings – Charles Jr., Helen (deceased), Catherine Blanche Burgess – nurse and constant companion Willian T. Gossett – husband

Frederick Grant Banting – discovered insulin Charles Best and Clark Noble – assistants Bert Collip – biochemist John James Rickard Macleod – supervisor, always used “we” when talking about discovery

Frederick Madison Allen The Physiatric Institute “The Allen Diet” Eddie – interested in birds with Elizabeth Teddy Ryder – scrapbook with pictures of food, died age 76, last surviving member of first group treated by Banding, scrapbook in Fisher Rare Book Library at University of Toronto

George Henry Alexander Clowes Employed by Eli Lilly Approached Banting and Best at conference to get drug for Eli Lilly

Others: Dr. Joe Gilchrist – first human to receive insulin on 12-20-1921

 

For Discussion:

NOTE: Page numbers are from the 2010 paperback edition.

1.       Could you survive on “The Allen Diet?”

2.       It was only two about two years from the time Banting started working on the drug until it became available to diabetes patients.   This is much faster than today, except for the COVID vaccine.   Would you have volunteered your child to be one of the first to receive insulin?

3.       Banting’s lab used (and killed) many dogs and rabbits.   Could this be done today?  Was it worth the sacrifice of all the animals?

4.       Should Elizabeth feel guilty that she got the drug at the expense of another child who did not?

5.       Discuss Charles Hughes and his decision to use his political influence to get help for Elizabeth.  Should he have had second thoughts because his position helped his daughter at the expense of another child whose father was not well known and connected.

6.       Why do you think there was such a drastic change in Charles after he got the help for Elizabeth?

 

7.       The authors wrote that, “Charles now understood something that Elizabeth had learned through her years of trial – that the purpose of living is not to preserve life but to lose it.  Living is by necessity a process of continuous loss” (page 212).  They then wrote that his request “had released Charles to become more fully human than he had ever dared to be” (page 212).    What do you think the authors meant?

 

8.       Why do you think the authors chose the four people they did as the focus for their book? 

9.       There was a celebration on the ship to initiate those who had never crossed the equator before into the “Sons of Neptune.”  Have you crossed the equator?  Are you a Son (or Daughter) of Neptune?