Search among the set photo their digitized files World Health Organization (WHO)the Athens Photo World team also found a black and white image of Robert Doisneau.

The great French photographer, who, along with Cartier-Bresson, is considered the founder of photojournalism, found himself in 1958 in the small town of Genoac, in a harsh mountainous region in the center of France. The title of the photograph, according to the caption, is “The End of an Era”. The protagonist is 68-year-old Dr. Edmond and the city’s pharmacist, who was usually the right hand of every provincial doctor, performing routine tests and contacting him in case of doubt about a prescription.

Doisneau, writing his report, wrote that Dr. Edmond came from a long line of provincial physicians dating back to the reign of Louis XIV. “His kingdom covered a radius of 20 kilometers around his home. In 40 years of practice (during which he drove 10 cars, traveled a million kilometers and examined about 150,000 patients), Dr. Edmond saw public health problems move from tuberculosis, venereal diseases and infant mortality to cancer,” Doisneau wrote. Edmond’s testimonial, which has survived to this day: “Just 30 kilometers from me, I now have a radiologist, various specialists, two surgeons, a hospital with 90 beds and a clinic with 60 beds.

If there is an epidemic, the Department of Health takes over. Today, I am just as well equipped to treat my patients as a city doctor. Maybe even better because I know them all as if they were my family.”

The photo is on display at this year’s central exhibition of the Athens Photo World, held from today at the SNFCC under the title “Focus on Health – 75 Years of Progress and Challenges” and held in collaboration with the WHO European Office for Quality in Care in Athens. It is this photograph that is included in the Every Day section of the exhibition, as the curatorial team made sure to cover the entire range of WHO activities in creating a high-quality photo exhibition.

Their idea of ​​reaching out to the organization and “digging up” its valuable records in the countries where it operates was immediately accepted. As one of the six WHO Regional Offices in the world, the WHO Regional Office for Europe serves 53 countries and nearly 1 billion people. It aims to achieve universal health coverage, protect people from health emergencies, and promote health and well-being, while leaving no one behind.

Amazing progress

“This is a poignant reminder of what binds us and what we can achieve together,” comments Dr. Hans Kluge.

“This is an opportunity to celebrate the amazing achievements in public health since 1948 and reflect on the events that paved the way for the founding of the United Nations and the World Health Organization, its specialized agency dedicated to global health,” he writes. y in his introductory note to the report, Dr Hans Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe.

“Following the qualitative leap in hygiene and health in the 19th century, the first half of the 20th century remains a stark reminder of how conflict, economic collapse and poor living conditions affect our lives and health.”

“The exhibition is not ‘medical’ in the narrow sense of the word, it’s more of a humanitarian one,” explains Christina Calligianni on behalf of Athens Photo World. “It enables the public to experience the work of the organization beyond statistics, figures, data and instructions, beyond narrow scientific barriers, through images of the familiar and accessible world of which we are all members.”

Photos by more than eighty photographers – Greek and foreign – cover a long course and wide action. From 1950s Thessaly to the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing war in Ukraine, and the recent earthquake that rocked Turkey and Syria last February, old and new photographs in the exhibition form a diverse mosaic of our world.

“This is a poignant reminder of what binds us and what we can achieve together in good times and in times of upheaval, crisis and hardship,” says Dr. Kluge.

Focused on Health, running through June 30.