He was at Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, and fortunately for him, a small team of doctors led by a Dr. Howard Florey had managed to synthesize a very small amount of penicillin, a drug that had been discovered 12 years before by Alexander Fleming but had never actually been used to treat a human, and indeed no one even knew if the drug would work, if it was full of impurities that would kill the patient, but Florey and his team figured if they had to use it, they might as well use it on someone who was going to die anyway.
Estaba en Radcliffe Infirmary en Oxford, y, para su suerte, un equipo pequeño de médicos dirigidos por un tal Dr. Howard Florey lograron sintetizar una cantidad mínima de penicilina, fármaco descubierto 12 años antes por Alexander Fleming pero jamás utilizado para tratar a un humano. Nadie sabía siquiera si funcionaría el medicamento o si contenía impurezas que matarían al paciente, pero Florey y su equipo pensaban que si debían usarlo, ¿por qué no usarlo en alguien que moriría de todas formas?