Klaus Thielmann

Physician-Biochemist. Germany. He studied at Karl Marx University of Leipzig and Erfurt Medical Academy, graduating MD in 1957. Assistant Researcher in biochemistry at the Universities of Jena and Greifswald from 1959 to 1963 and qualified as a Senior Lecturer in Jena in 1965. From 1968 to 1971 he worked as a visiting professor at the CNIC and collaborated with other Cuban institutions. He is the founder of the specialty of Clinical Biochemistry. He taught the first postgraduate courses in Cuba in the lines of laboratory methodology and Pathological Biochemistry. On his return to the GDR in 1974 he was appointed Senior Professor of the Medical Academy of Erfurt, of which he was Vice President from 1976-1982 and directing, at the same time, the Institute of Pathobiochemistry . In 1982 he was appointed Deputy Minister in charge of medical studies at the Ministry of Higher Education of the GDR and between January 1989 and April 1990 he served as Minister of Health of that country. From all these positions, for decades, he maintained an active collaboration with Cuban institutions, especially regarding the training of scientists. After the fall of the GDR he served for a time as professor at the Charité Hospital in Berlin, but later had to emigrate and worked for several years as a consultant on health issues at international organizations in Central Asia and Russia. He currently resides in Germany, where he is closely linked to organizations of solidarity with Cuba and maintains a cooperative project with family doctors of Old Havana, promoting a model of active promotion of health. He is the author of a book on Methodology in Clinical Biochemistry and of other on Pathobiochemistry. Also he is the lead author of a multilingual dictionary of Biochemistry, all published in the GDR and known in Cuba. He was granted in Cuba the special scientific status of Merit Researcher.