Jenny Cohen

Jenny Cohen (born November 9, 1905 in Wolbeck ; †  June 8, 1976 in Blankenfelde-Mahlow ) was a German dentist who made outstanding contributions to the development of youth dental care in the GDR .

Life

Raised as a child of Jewish parents, she studied dentistry at the universities of Münster and Würzburg in 1926 after graduating from high school . In 1929 she qualified as a dentist and in 1930 was awarded a Dr. med. dent. PhD . The practice opened in Herbern / Westphalia in the summer of 1932 was only able to operate to a limited extent due to the boycott of the Jews on April 1, 1933; She therefore emigrated to the Netherlands as a racially persecuted person in the summer of 1933 , where she earned her living as a domestic servant. After marrying the German engineer Albert Cohen, she traveled via Switzerland and Austria to Moscow , where she worked as a dentist in a polyclinic until she was expelled to Sweden . From 1937 she worked as a domestic worker in Stockholm and from 1942 as a district dentist in Färila in northern Sweden .

In 1947 Jenny Cohen returned to Germany. At first she worked in the German Central Health Administration as a consultant for youth dental care, before moving to the Ministry of Health of the GDR in 1949 , where in 1953 she was the main consultant in charge of the “Dental Care” department (later the stomatology sector ). Above all, she made outstanding contributions to the uniform status of dentists and dentists as well as the development of youth dental care according to the Alfred Kantorowicz introduced the Bonn system (regulations for youth dental care 1954 and 1958). With particular commitment she promoted oral prevention as well as the equality of dentists and doctors. In 1959 she was awarded the GDR Medal of Merit and in 1965 with the title of Honored Doctor of the People .

literature

• W. Bethmann: Jenny Cohen passed away. 1905-1976 . In: Stomatologie der DDR , ISSN  0302-4725 , Vol. 26 (1976), pp. 713 f.
• MF Scholz: Would you like some Scandinavian experience? Disadvantage and remigration. The former KPD emigrants in Scandinavia and their further fate in the Soviet Zone / GDR. Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-515-07651-4 , pp. 146-148, 177, 351.