Biography of former WHO director-general published in English

Lee Jong-wook: A Life in

Health and Politics

(WHO, KOFIH)

A biography of the late Lee Jong-wook, who served as the director-general of the World Health Organization from 2003 to 2006, has been published in English.

The publication of the book was jointly funded by the WHO and Korea Foundation for International Healthcare (KOFIH). It was written by Desmond Avery, a former editor of the Bulletin of the World Health Organization, who also worked as Lee’s speech writer during his years as the director-general at the U.N. agency.

The book chronicles Lee’s early years as well as his 23 years with WHO until his death in 2006 at the age of 61.

Born in 1945 in Seoul, Lee received his medical degree from Seoul National University.

While attending the school, he volunteered to treat people with Hansen’s disease living in the St. Lazarus Village in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province. The village is also the place where Lee met his future-wife, Reiko Kaburaki, a Japanese woman who was in Korea at the time as a volunteer.

Lee joined the WHO in 1983 as an adviser on Hansen’s disease in Fiji. He moved to Geneva in 1994, and worked as the director of a global program for vaccines and immunization. During his three years as the director-general, from 2003 to 2006, he visited some 60 countries, including Sudan, and numerous disaster sites.

He abruptly died of fatigue while preparing for a U.N. general meeting in May of 2006.

According to KOFIH, a special ceremony celebrating the book’s release will be held at the United Nations Office in Geneva on May 22, which is the anniversary of Lee’s death.

The upcoming event will be attended by a number of big-name figures, including Lee’s wife Reiko Kaburaki, the current Director-General of WHO Margaret Chan, Korea’s Health and Welfare Minister Rim Chai-min, and KOFIH President Han Kwang-soo.

The book’s Korean edition will be published later this year.

Meanwhile, WHO will award its annual $100,000 Lee Jong-wook Memorial Prize for excellence in public health to the New Zealand-based Pacific Leprosy Foundation on May 24.

(dyc@heraldcorp.com)