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Hans Rosling
Photo Richard Horton
Obituary
Hans Rosling Statistician and physician with a flair for communication. Born in Uppsala, Sweden, on July 27, 1948, he died there of pancreatic cancer on Feb 7, 2017, aged 68 years.
For Hans Rosling’s TED talk see https://www.ted.com/talks/ hans_rosling_reveals_new_ insights_on_poverty
694
Speakers who present complex statistical data seldom captivate their audiences. But when Hans Rosling was in charge of interpreting health and other social statistics and disseminating their message, this changed. The variously coloured elements of the displays on his screens were dynamic: rising and falling, swelling and shrinking, changing colour and position, moving and colliding. Backed by simple and lucid commentary, his kaleidoscopic imagery would reveal what was happening to, say, the health of a population with respect to diet, or the impact of small movements in its fertility. Rosling’s magnetic showmanship was a model of the art of effective communication. “Hans had the unique quality of simplifying complexities and presenting them with humour, which made us listen, question, and have a more informed debate”, says Mariam Claeson, Director of Maternal, Newborn and Child Health at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Only Rosling had the audacity to cap a bravura TED talk on poverty with a demonstration of sword swallowing. Statistics were where Rosling’s career began, and where it ended—but with much in between. Born into a workingclass home in Uppsala, Sweden, he graduated in statistics from Uppsala University in 1967, studied public health at St John’s Medical College in Bangalore, India, completed his medical training at Uppsala in 1974, and then went to Africa, with his wife Agneta and their young children. He spent 2 years as a district medical officer for some 300 000 people in northern Mozambique. Why there? Helena Nordenstedt,
an Assistant Professor of Global Health at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute, worked closely with Rosling in recent years. She believes he was keeping a promise he had made as a politically active student to a friend from Mozambique: a promise to help out when it achieved independence. During those years, his district suffered an epidemic of a strange and permanently disabling paralysis known as konzo. He discovered that it was caused by cassava that had not been properly prepared to remove its cyanic acid. Konzo, the subject of Rosling’s PhD, was a continuing source of fascination to him. From rainfall maps of Africa he was able to predict droughts, crop failure—and new konzo epidemics. On returning to Sweden, in 1981, he moved into global health at the Karolinska. This came about by chance, says Nordenstedt. “He was asked to fill in for an absent lecturer. They liked him so much they asked him back, and finally offered him a full-time position.” He gave up clinical work to devote himself wholeheartedly to global health. In 1997, he was appointed Professor of International Health, and 4 years later took over the leadership of the Division of Global Health. During this time he became increasingly concerned that the students he met were ill-informed about global development. Why did they still see the world as divided into “developed” and “developing” countries when low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries were actually parts of a continuum of economic development? With his son Ola and daughter-in-law Anna, Rosling developed the Trendalyzer software for visualising and animating statistical information on health and development. The technology was purchased by Google in 2007, and Rosling used the proceeds to start the Gapminder Foundation, a non-profit organisation that promotes sustainable global development through the greater use and understanding of statistics. He embarked on a crusade of presentations and public conversations. “He made statistics a valuable asset in presenting messages to people”, says immunologist Professor Hans Wigzell, a past President of the Karolinska. Jerker Liljestrand, a maternal health specialist at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, describes Rosling as “smart, compassionate, and funny”, adding that his friend of 40 years “managed to change the mindset of many people in global development—he described himself as an edutainer with a mission to spread facts and challenge myths”. But not everyone wanted to hear what Rosling had to say. “Hans was frequently accused of being too optimistic”, Wigzell says. “He would fight back, saying ‘I’m not optimistic, I’m objective’…but he never allowed his critics to become enemies…they normally ended up being his good friends.” Stefan Peterson, Chief of UNICEF’s Health Section, encapsulates the key ingredients of Rosling’s success: “Hans was undaunted by authority, original in thought, and unparalleled in telling complex stories simply.” Rosling leaves his wife Agneta, sons Ola and Magnus, and a daughter Anna.
Geoff Watts www.thelancet.com Vol 389 February 18, 2017
Obituary
Hans Rosling Statistician and physician with a flair for communication. Born in Uppsala, Sweden, on July 27, 1948, he died there of pancreatic cancer on Feb 7, 2017, aged 68 years.
For Hans Rosling’s TED talk see https://www.ted.com/talks/ hans_rosling_reveals_new_ insights_on_poverty
694
Speakers who present complex statistical data seldom captivate their audiences. But when Hans Rosling was in charge of interpreting health and other social statistics and disseminating their message, this changed. The variously coloured elements of the displays on his screens were dynamic: rising and falling, swelling and shrinking, changing colour and position, moving and colliding. Backed by simple and lucid commentary, his kaleidoscopic imagery would reveal what was happening to, say, the health of a population with respect to diet, or the impact of small movements in its fertility. Rosling’s magnetic showmanship was a model of the art of effective communication. “Hans had the unique quality of simplifying complexities and presenting them with humour, which made us listen, question, and have a more informed debate”, says Mariam Claeson, Director of Maternal, Newborn and Child Health at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Only Rosling had the audacity to cap a bravura TED talk on poverty with a demonstration of sword swallowing. Statistics were where Rosling’s career began, and where it ended—but with much in between. Born into a workingclass home in Uppsala, Sweden, he graduated in statistics from Uppsala University in 1967, studied public health at St John’s Medical College in Bangalore, India, completed his medical training at Uppsala in 1974, and then went to Africa, with his wife Agneta and their young children. He spent 2 years as a district medical officer for some 300 000 people in northern Mozambique. Why there? Helena Nordenstedt,
an Assistant Professor of Global Health at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute, worked closely with Rosling in recent years. She believes he was keeping a promise he had made as a politically active student to a friend from Mozambique: a promise to help out when it achieved independence. During those years, his district suffered an epidemic of a strange and permanently disabling paralysis known as konzo. He discovered that it was caused by cassava that had not been properly prepared to remove its cyanic acid. Konzo, the subject of Rosling’s PhD, was a continuing source of fascination to him. From rainfall maps of Africa he was able to predict droughts, crop failure—and new konzo epidemics. On returning to Sweden, in 1981, he moved into global health at the Karolinska. This came about by chance, says Nordenstedt. “He was asked to fill in for an absent lecturer. They liked him so much they asked him back, and finally offered him a full-time position.” He gave up clinical work to devote himself wholeheartedly to global health. In 1997, he was appointed Professor of International Health, and 4 years later took over the leadership of the Division of Global Health. During this time he became increasingly concerned that the students he met were ill-informed about global development. Why did they still see the world as divided into “developed” and “developing” countries when low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries were actually parts of a continuum of economic development? With his son Ola and daughter-in-law Anna, Rosling developed the Trendalyzer software for visualising and animating statistical information on health and development. The technology was purchased by Google in 2007, and Rosling used the proceeds to start the Gapminder Foundation, a non-profit organisation that promotes sustainable global development through the greater use and understanding of statistics. He embarked on a crusade of presentations and public conversations. “He made statistics a valuable asset in presenting messages to people”, says immunologist Professor Hans Wigzell, a past President of the Karolinska. Jerker Liljestrand, a maternal health specialist at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, describes Rosling as “smart, compassionate, and funny”, adding that his friend of 40 years “managed to change the mindset of many people in global development—he described himself as an edutainer with a mission to spread facts and challenge myths”. But not everyone wanted to hear what Rosling had to say. “Hans was frequently accused of being too optimistic”, Wigzell says. “He would fight back, saying ‘I’m not optimistic, I’m objective’…but he never allowed his critics to become enemies…they normally ended up being his good friends.” Stefan Peterson, Chief of UNICEF’s Health Section, encapsulates the key ingredients of Rosling’s success: “Hans was undaunted by authority, original in thought, and unparalleled in telling complex stories simply.” Rosling leaves his wife Agneta, sons Ola and Magnus, and a daughter Anna.
Geoff Watts www.thelancet.com Vol 389 February 18, 2017