THE HISTORY OF THE INSTITUTE OF PUBLIC HEALTH OF SERBIA "DR MILAN JOVANOVIĆ BATUT"

This year, the Institute of Public Health of Serbia” Dr Milan Jovanović Batut” commemorates one hundred years of its existence. Immediately after the end of World War I, with the establishment of a special government body, the Ministry of National Health (1919) and its expert advisory body – Standing Epidemic Commission chaired by Dr Milan Jovanović Batut (1847–1940), preparations began for the establishment of the first preventive institutions. Foundation of the Central Institute for Hygiene in Belgrade in 1924 played a crucial role in the development of the preventative activities in the country at the time.

The establishment of a “Great Institute of Bacteriology and Hygiene in Belgrade” was proposed by the representative of the Ministry of Army in the Standing Epidemic Commission, the medical colonel Dr Lazar Genčić (1868–1942). The establishment of such an institution was very actively discussed by the Hygiene Department of the Ministry of National Health, led by Dr Andrija Štampar (1888–1958). Based on the Law on the Establishment of the Ministry of National Health and the Law on the Establishment of Special Medical Institutions for the Study and Containment of Infectious Diseases dated 25 November 1921, the Rulebook on the Establishment and Organization of the Central Institute of Hygiene was adopted on 15 October 1924, X no. 46447, which stipulates: “The Institute is the centre of the entire hygiene service in the country and all hygiene institutions in the country are subordinate to it.”

The former Central Institute of Hygiene has undergone several transformations in its hundred years of existence, including changing its name. Since 1979, at the proposal of the Special Commission of Distinguished Physicians, it has proudly borne the name of Dr Milan Jovanović Batut. It is well known that there was no significant work in the country related to the health of the people that Dr Milan Jovanović Batut did not participate in. This health educator was a professor of forensic medicine and hygiene at the former Great School in Belgrade and the first Dean of the Faculty of Medicine in Belgrade (1920), playing the most important role in its establishment. At the same time, he personally made an enormous contribution to the work of the Ministry of Health at the time, as well as to the development of healthcare legislation.

Institute of Public Health of Serbia “Dr Milan Jovanović Batut” is the umbrella national institution in the field of preventive medicine. In the year of the jubilee of the institution, which bears the name of one of the most deserving of our physicians, we also mark 180 years of preventive medicine in Serbia. Just as our founder, Dr Milan Jovanović Batut, once worked on the preservation of national health, it is up to us to continue “paying our debt to our people”, just like he did, working in the institution that now bears his name.