SUBSCRIBE NOW

SIGHT

Be informed. Be challenged. Be inspired.

World mourns passing of Ruth Pfau, Pakistan’s “Mother Teresa”

The world is mourning the death of German-born Catholic nun and physician, Dr Ruth Pfau, who, known as Pakistan’s ‘Mother Teresa’, played an instrumental role in combatting leprosy in the nation.

Dr Pfau’s order – the Daughters of the Heart of Mary – announced she died in a hospital in Karachi at the age of 87 late last week after a prolonged illness.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said that while Dr Pfau may have been born in Germany, “her heart was always in Pakistan”.

“Dr Ruth came to Pakistan here at the dawn of a young nation, looking to make lives better for those afflicted by disease, and in doing so, found herself a home,” the BBC reported him as saying.

Dr Pfau first encountered leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, in Pakistan in 1960 and returned in 1962 to establish a network of more than 150 clinics across the nation aimed at tackling the disease under the banner of the Karachi-based Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre. It was due to her efforts that the World Health Organization was able to declare that the disease was under control in the nation in 1996.

Harald Meyer-Porzky, of the Germany-based Ruth Pfau Foundation, said Dr Pfau had “given hundreds of thousands of people a life of dignity”.

Dr Pfau, who will be buried following a funeral mass in St Patrick’s Cathedral in Karachi on 19th August, received numerous awards for her work including the Hilal-e-Imtiaz – Pakistan’s second highest civilian award – in 1979 and the German Staufer Medal in 2015.

An online condolence book has been opened for people to share their thoughts.

Donate



sight plus logo

Sight+ is a new benefits program we’ve launched to reward people who have supported us with annual donations of $26 or more. To find out more about Sight+ and how you can support the work of Sight, head to our Sight+ page.

Musings

TAKE PART IN THE SIGHT READER SURVEY!

We’re interested to find out more about you, our readers, as we improve and expand our coverage and so we’re asking all of our readers to take this survey (it’ll only take a couple of minutes).

To take part in the survey, simply follow this link…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

For security, use of Google's reCAPTCHA service is required which is subject to the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.