The Rearview Podcast | The Vaccine Man: The Ukrainian who helped save India from cholera and plague

Waldemar Mordechai Wolff Haffkine (1860–1930), born in Odessa (then part of the Russian Empire, now Ukraine), was a pioneering Jewish bacteriologist who spent more than two decades working in India. Barred from academic positions in Russia due to antisemitic restrictions, he fled first to Switzerland and then to Paris, where he worked at the Pasteur Institute.

In 1892, Haffkine developed the world’s first effective cholera vaccine, boldly testing it on himself before beginning wider trials. In 1893, he travelled to India, where he conducted successful large-scale field tests.

When bubonic plague struck Bombay in 1896, Haffkine urgently created the first plague vaccine in a modest laboratory, again testing it on himself before launching mass inoculation campaigns. His vaccines proved highly effective in curbing both cholera and plague, earning him the reputation of a “saviour of mankind.”

Despite his monumental achievements, Haffkine remains little known today. One of the few visible reminders of his legacy is Mumbai’s Haffkine Institute, which continues to bear his name.

Hosts: Sobhana K Nair and Jacob Koshy

Producer and editor: Jude Weston

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