It is the late 1890s in Germany, and a new accessory designed to protect others just arrived in town. Surgeons at that time, however, didn’t want to use such a thing. This accessory was meant to keep bacteria from spreading as surgeons put their hands inside their patients' body cavities. The accessory was surgical gloves.
“Many historical accounts show deep impatience with past surgeons’ hesitation to adopt surgical gloves,” writes Thomas Schlich, historian of medicine… It would take “more than a decade of passionate argument” before surgeons finally accepted gloves as a necessity.
Learn more about how surgical gloves became widely accepted in Germany, as well as how surgical gloves evolved over time, over at JSTOR Daily.
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