Sabine Lange (nurse)

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Sabine Lange (born July 10, 1936 in Berlin-Tempelhof ; † September 18, 1998 in Thailand ) was a German nurse at the Tropical Institute in West Berlin .

Through her dealings with the patients, especially during the partly anonymous screening tests, she won the trust of gay men and was the first to recognize the need for a self-help organization when HIV / AIDS became known in the early 1980s. Through her initiative, the German AIDS Aid was founded in the autumn of 1983 .

Life

Sabine Lange was born as the daughter of a doctor in Berlin-Tempelhof, where she grew up with her sisters who, like them, became nurses. In the 1970s, Sabine Lange worked at the Berlin “State Vaccination Institute with Tropical Medicine Advice Center” (renamed “State Institute for Tropical Medicine” in 1984 and “Institute for Tropical Medicine” in 1995 and now as “Institute for Tropical Medicine and International Health Berlin”) at the Berlin University Medical Center integrated) and offered advice on vaccinations, among other things. Her clients included many gay men who traveled frequently, e.g. B. to the USA - and not infrequently returned with sometimes rare sexually transmitted diseases, which is why this became a focus of the institute's work. When Ulrich Bienzle came to the state vaccination institute in 1982 , he soon began testing gay men for intestinal parasites. The institute also studies offered on hepatitis infections and vaccinations with the just-developed vaccine against hepatitis B to. Sabine Lange also played an important role in providing information and support.

Shortly afterwards, Bienzle learned from colleagues about an illness that initially only appeared in gays in the USA. He quickly became one of the central figures in German AIDS research and prevention. Sabine Lange was also frequently approached about the new disease - often by leather men who made up a large group of US tourists. In view of the high demand for information, Lange went to gay bars early on as a contact person. Due to their urging and only supported by the entrepreneur Bruno Gmünder , some gay men from the leather and fetish scene as well as from the gay movement, which is part of the politically left scene, founded the German AIDS Aid on September 23, 1983. She was elected to the first board of directors together with Thomas, the host of the Bar Knolle, and the lawyer Stefan Reiss.

From October 1986 to June 1991, Lange worked for the federal model project Streetwork as part of the federal government's emergency program to combat HIV infection.

On October 1, 1988, she received the Order of Merit of the State of Berlin for her commitment .

In 1998, two days after her son, she died of cancer in Thailand at the age of 62. Her ashes were buried on February 26, 1999 in the municipal cemetery Eythstrasse in Berlin.

Honors

  • Honorary member of the German AIDS Aid
  • 1988: Order of Merit of the State of Berlin

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ 2007/2008 yearbook of the German AIDS Aid Association, Berlin, published in September 2008, page A62
  2. ↑ Yearbook 2007/2008 of the German AIDS Aid eV, Berlin, published in September 2008, page A55
  3. ↑ Stefan Reiss
  4. ^ Obituary by Sabine Lange in the annual report of the Deutsche AIDS-Hilfe eV, Berlin, published May 1999, page 13
personal data
SURNAME Lange, Sabine
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German nurse in the Tropical Institute in West Berlin
DATE OF BIRTH July 10, 1936
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin-Tempelhof
DATE OF DEATH September 18, 1998
Place of death Thailand