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Bernhard Kuenburg, president of the Semmelweis Foundation, gestures during an interview in front of a commemorative plaque for pioneering scientist Ignaz Phillip Semmelweis, in Vienna on June 28, 2018. - Decades before Louis Pasteur won widespread acceptance for the germ theory of disease, Ignac Semmelweis was battling his peers to accept what is today medical orthodoxy -- doctors should thoroughly disinfect their hands before treating patients. Born 200 years ago, on July 1, 1818, Semmelweis joined the obstetrics department of Vienna's general hospital in 1846 and was immediately struck by the extremely high maternal mortality rate in the wing where student doctors doctors trained: it stood at more than 10 percent, at times going up to almost 40 percent. (Photo by ALEX HALADA / AFP) (Photo credit should read ALEX HALADA/AFP via Getty Images)