[The Austrian pediatrician Theodor Escherich as bacteriologist and social hygienist: The 100th anniversary of his death on February 15th, 1911].

Escherich was born on November 29, 1857 in Ansbach, Bavaria. He has been director of the children hospitals in Graz (Styria, Austria) from 1890 and Vienna (Austria) from 1902, started his bacteriological investigations in 1884 during a short stay in St. Anna Children Hospital in Vienna. This he continued it as an assistant in Munich and as clinic director in Graz. On the basis of his bacteriological findings in breast-milk, which proved to be sterile, he wanted to detect the physiological and pathogenetic role of the intestinal flora of breast-fed babies and of infants. In stained slides of meconium and milk-faeces he found cocci, bacilli with and without spores and yeasts. Among them he intensively investigated both the "Bacterium lactis aërogenes" (now: "Aerobacter aerogenes"), and the "Bacterium coli commune". In 1919, 8 years after his death, the name "Escherichia coli" was used for the first time and became the valid species name. This posthumous honour made Escherich worldwide known in the medical profession. Also for further enteric pathogens, the Campylobacter/Helicobacter group, which could not be cultured in Escherich's time he is looked upon as the first describer. In Graz and particularly in Vienna, Escherich's social-medical activities were concentrated on the baby and infant welfare. This was promoted by the construction of baby departments in hospitals, instructions of mothers, improvement of baby nutriments, and training of baby nurses and midwifes. The first great aim was the establishment of the "Reichsanstalt für Mutter- und Säuglingsfürsorge" (Imperial Institution for Mother and Baby Welfare) in Vienna which could come in action only during World War I in October 1915, thus 4 1/2 years after Escherich's death on February 15, 1911.