A.V. Molkov – the founder of hygiene of children and adolescents, manager of the training of medical and preventive personnel (to the 155th anniversary from his birth)

Among the largest representatives of the Russian medical science, professor Alfred Vladislavovich Molkov, a prominent hygienist and health manager, honoured scientist, holds an honourable place. In 2025, the entire hygienic community will celebrate his 155th anniversary. The medical, scientific, and pedagogical activity of A.V. Molkov, which lasted for more than fifty years, was associated with the development of country council medicine, with the most important stages of the formation of soviet healthcare. There is no field of hygiene and public health in which the multifaceted talent of this great scientist has not manifested itself. Alfred Vladislavovich went down in the history of medicine and healthcare as a talented manager and expert in health education. About over two decades, he headed the work of the commission for the dissemination of hygienic knowledge of the society of Russian doctors in memory of N.I. Pirogov. A.V. Molkov was the founder of the creation of school hygiene. He formulated goals and objectives, identified the main ways of research and pedagogical work in this field, developed a methodology for teaching this scientific discipline. A.V. Molkov played an important role in the formation of the first departments of educational hygiene and writing the first Soviet manual on school hygiene, as well as in the formation of the school of Soviet hygienists. Until the end of his life, Alfred Vladislavovich remained devoted to the cause of preventive medicine. His words, written in 1940, are addressed to us as a testament: “It is impossible to prevent the occurrence of diseases without treating the sick, and it is impossible to know the importance of the environment for the human body without studying the latter... It is clear that there is no fundamental opposition between curative medicine and preventive medicine, but there is their unity with a well-known division of tasks and functions”.

Alfred Vladislavovich Molkov, school hygiene, hygiene of children and adolescents, rural medicine, medical and preventive care