In the faint light of a Canadian January, the ward in Toronto’s university hospital is in semidarkness. Local physician Ed Jeffrey enters the room and he walks towards one of the beds. In his hand he holds a large syringe with a 45mm-long injection needle.
He cautiously removes the blanket from the patient, Leonard Thompson. The boy is only 14 years old, but he somehow looks both younger and older at the same time. He weighs less than 30kg, and has lost most of his hair. His hip and breast bones protrude, and the stomach is inflated. There is a sharp smell of acetone in the air, which Ed Jeffery knows is characteristic of diabetics. And he knows that the boy Leonard is dying.
Jeffrey uses the needle to inject through the almost non-existing fat layer under the boy’s skin and into the large gluteal muscle of one of the boy’s buttocks, injecting a brownish liquid. Exactly 7.5ml is required.
The patient’s other buttock gets a shot as well, before the doctor jots down the date – 11 January 1922. Now, all they can do is wait. And hope.
Leonard Thompson was not the only one waiting
