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REVIEWS: Gavin Yamey Pox: Genius, Madness, and the Mysteries of Syphilis BMJ 2003; 327: 1173-a [Full text]

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Retrospective diagnosis of syphilis

Hanus Weisl   (26 November 2003)

Making Sense of Hitler

Mark N. Lowenthal FRCPE   (29 November 2003)

Retrospective diagnosis of syphilis 26 November 2003
Hanus Weisl, Retired Orthopaedic Surgeon 10 Greenlawns, Cardiff CF23 6AW Send response to journal: Re: Retrospective diagnosis of syphilis	I read Yamey's review of Hayden's book (Pox: Genius, Madness and the Mysteries of Syphilis) with interest. I remember when I was a senior registrar in 1962/3: an elderly man was admitted with radiological lucencies in his femoral or tibial condyles; in those days this was regarded as a characteristic of neuropathic (Charcot) joints. A famous neurologist was called and he confirmed the diagnosis of neuro-syphilis. A few years later papers were published showing that such radiological changes were due to avascular necrosis of the condyles in osteoarthritis - I still shudder with discomfort at what we did to this old man. I was born in Czechoslovakia and I was interested to be told that the two major Czech composers, Smetana and Dvorak were both supposed to have had neuro-syphilis on the basis that in their later years they suffered from deafness and dementia - I do not understand why the two old men should not just have suffered primary deafness and dementia and why the retrospective diagnosis of syphilis was made. Yours sincerely H Weisl Competing interests: None declared
Making Sense of Hitler 29 November 2003
Mark N. Lowenthal FRCPE, irrelevant for this personal view 29 Oren, Omer 84965, Israel Send response to journal: Re: Making Sense of Hitler	In the enthusiastic maximum four of four stars this book earned in the review, the third paragraph, reading "And Hitler's life...make sense...syphilis...Jewish prostitute" sent me on a trip of imagination and speculation. I imagined the Latvian villagers in 1941 herding my grandmother and her daughter and son in law, and granddaughters, to the place where the villagers proceeded to shoot them, as happened. I speculated how this putative (word play unintended) Jewish prostitute and her spirochaetes led Hitler to dispatch his troops to invade the Soviet Union and its conquests, and how the villagers, under these troops' protection, proceeded to settle their scores with my grandmother. And I further speculated how the burden of the paragraph may be another facet of Europe's current growing rejection of the political incorrectness of Jew-blaming. Et tu, BMJ? And maybe the warriors on terror are hunting that syphilitic American prostitute whose germs and charms may yet make sense of 9/11? Competing interests: None declared