Professor Cyril Höschl, laureate of the Neuron Award for lifelong contribution to science, has died
After a long fight with a serious illness, Professor Cyril Höschl has died, a significant Czech psychiatrist, scientist and science communicator to whom we were proud to present the Neuron Award for lifelong contribution to science last year.
Professor Höschl was a striking figure of Czech and world psychiatry. His professional path began at a time when the field of psychiatry was what "was left" for him, as he himself recalled with detachment. Even so, it was in this very area that he managed to leave an indelible mark — as a scientist, as a teacher, but above all as a tireless demolisher of prejudices about psychiatric patients.
He was the first president of the European Psychiatric Association from the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, he reformed the Third Faculty of Medicine of Charles University and he founded the National Institute of Mental Health in Klecany, a unique institution combining research, education and care for patients.
His scientific focus ranged from biological psychiatry to neuroendocrinology, but his strongest legacy lies in popularising psychiatry and destigmatising mental illness.
"Professor Höschl worked tirelessly all his life to improve the standard of Czech and world psychiatry. He managed to fire students with enthusiasm for studying this field and at the same time he was able to reach the general public. He helped us understand the importance of psychiatry and did much to ensure that society no longer looks down on psychiatric patients so much," says Monika Vondráková, director of the Neuron Foundation.
"We will miss Cyril Höschl on a personal level too. When we presented him with the Neuron Award last year, he accepted it with incredible humility and humour. He talked to us about music, about exceptional meetings with significant figures from abroad, but also about where our society is heading, and about death. Despite his state of health he spent a lovely afternoon with us and his wife Jitka, which will stay in my memory for a long time," she adds.
"Psychiatric patients — with rare exceptions — do not bite and do not murder," Cyril Höschl said in an interview for the Neuron Award. He devoted his life to making sure the public knew that too.
Thank you, professor.
