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Dispersal and Renewal: Hong Kong University Medical and Health Services Guan Bee Ong Guan Bee Ong, born in Sarawak, Malaysia in 1921, received his MBBS degree from the University of Hong Kong in 1947 qfter medical studies in Hong Kong and China. Following postgraduate work in Edinburgh and London, he served as Surgeon-in-Charge at Kowloon Hospital from 1957 to 1963. In 1964 he was appointed Professor of Surgery at the university, becoming emeritus in 1982. His distinguished career in the Faculty of Medicine led to the award of an honorary DSc degree in 1969 and an OBE (Civil) in 1966, as well as Gold Medals from the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (1970), the Royal Australasian College ofSurgeons (1982) and other international institutions, and honorary fellowships from a dozen medical centres including The Royal College ofPhysicians and Surgeons of Glasgow (1977), and of Canada (1978), the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland (1983) and the American College of Surgeons (1975). Dr Ong has published over 250 papers on various aspects ofgeneral surgery as well as appropriate chapters in books and monographs, and has been a visiting professor and lecturer worldwide at universities in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia. He says, (I would do the same things if I had to live my life all over again.' O n 8 December 1941, the medical and health services in Hong Kong were thrown into disarray. It was the beginning of the winter holidays and at 8 a.m. Japanese war planes could be clearly seen bombing Kai Tak Airport. Queen Mary Hospital, the main hospital for the general public, was not adequate to take in all the expected casualties. The Great Hall of the University of Hong Kong was therefore pressed into service. Even this was not considered to be sufficient and a university hostel, Eliot Hall, as well as the Tang Chi Ngong School of Chinese were quickly 389 390 Guan Bee Ong converted into convalescing annexes. Provisions were brought and stored in the wardens' quarters at Eliot Hall. Students who were not drafted as Hong Kong Volunteers served as stretcher bearers and helped to transport the much needed provisions. Professor Gordon King, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine as well as Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, was the driving force in the organization of care for the sick and wounded. With the surrender of Hong Kong to the Japanese forces on Christmas Day, many of the students who had been living in May and Lugard Halls left Hong Kong for mainland China. Wearing workers' cotton clothes and carrying all their belongings in canvas bags, they had no difficulty passing through the sentries who guarded the Star Ferry Pier. A group of 13 students from the Medical, Engineering and Arts Faculties left on Friday, 13 February 1942. We sailed in a steamer of 99 tons to Port Bayard (a French concession in the peninsula opposite Hainan Island) where we learned of the fall of Singapore. We then trekked inland across Kwangtung to Kwangsi Province. There, in Kweilin, we saw Professor Gordon King, who instructed us to proceed to Kweiyang, Kweichow Province, and to stay with the Chinese Red Cross which was under the directorship of Dr Robert Lim, Professor of Physiology at the Peking Union Medical College. Professor King had already met with the British Ambassador and the Chinese Minister of Education in Chungking and had arranged to have students from the University of Hong Kong admitted to various universities considered to be of equivalent standard to HKU. He kept a register of all Hong Kong students and looked after them throughout the war years. Eventually our group of 13 continued their studies in the Chungking area, the engineering students at the Central University in Shapingpa, and the medical students at the National Shanghai Medical College at Koloshan. Life was Spartan. Food was of the poorest quality. In winter the cold, and in summer the bed bugs and fleas, made life almost unbearable. Several students left off studying to find work in the city or joined the army as interpreters to be attached to the Allied forces in China. Many resumed their studies when the war ended and subsequently graduated as doctors or engineers. Of the 13 in the first group to leave Hong Kong, most graduated and were successful in their professions. Despite the hardship, only one of our party died of pulmonary tuberculosis and was buried in the hillside of the Medical College...

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