Did you know that Croatian physician Andrija Štampar was one of the founders of the World Health Organization? As an expert in social medicine and hygiene, he addressed international healthcare issues and worked on the improvement of healthcare in Europe, the USA, China and Russia.

In 1946, he was elected first vice–president of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. He was actively involved in the founding of the World Health Organisation and presided over its inaugural meeting in Geneva in 1948. As its ambassador, he studied public health in Afghanistan, Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia. He also taught at the School of Medicine in Zagreb and later reformed the curriculum of the institution, as its dean.

As a pioneer of public health and healthcare in Croatia and former Yugoslavia, he founded a number of social and medical institutions. He believed that every person had a right to be healthy and that, therefore, healthcare services should be equally available to everyone, regardless of their social background. In 1955, the World Health Organisation awarded Štampar the Léon Bernard Foundation Prize and Medal, the greatest international recognition of merit in the field of social medicine.