Thomas Francis, Jr. (July 15, 1900 – Template:1969-10-01) was an American physician, virologist, and epidemiologist. Francis was the first person to isolate influenza virus in America, and in 1940 showed that there are other strains of influenza, and took part in the development of influenza vaccines.
Francis grew up in western Pennsylvania, graduated from Allegheny College on scholarship in 1921, and received his medical degree from Yale Univers...
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Thomas Francis, Jr. (July 15, 1900 – Template:1969-10-01) was an American physician, virologist, and epidemiologist. Francis was the first person to isolate influenza virus in America, and in 1940 showed that there are other strains of influenza, and took part in the development of influenza vaccines.
Francis grew up in western Pennsylvania, graduated from Allegheny College on scholarship in 1921, and received his medical degree from Yale University in 1925. Afterwards he joined an elite research team at the Rockefeller Institute, first doing research on vaccines against bacterial pneumonia, later he took up influenza research. He became the first American to isolate human flu virus.
From 1938 to 1941 he was professor of bacteriology and chair of the department of the New York University College of Medicine.
In 1941 he was appointed director of the Commission on Influenza of the United States Armed Forces Epidemiological Board (AFEB), a position which enabled him to take part in the...
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