Leonard A. Scheele
Encyclopedia
Leonard Andrew Scheele was an American physician and public servant. He was appointed the seventh Surgeon General of the United States
from 1948 to 1956.
. While in high school, he worked in his father's pharmacy
and planned to enter medicine
. For his undergraduate education, Scheele chose the University of Michigan
(B.A.
, 1931) over Indiana University
, citing the former's medical reputation but ended up following his future spouse, then a dental
student, to Detroit. He received his M.D.
in 1934 from the Detroit College of Medicine and Surgery (now the Wayne State University School of Medicine
).
. Inspired by one of his medical school professors, who taught preventive medicine
and directed the laboratories at the Michigan State Health Department, Scheele followed up on a recruitment visit by Public Health Service (PHS) officers from Detroit's Marine Hospital. Encouraged by his school's dean, he competed successfully for an internship at Chicago
's Marine Hospital (1933-1934). Once Scheele accepted a commission as an Assistant Surgeon
(July 2, 1934), he began a series of rotations at quarantine
stations, in San Francisco and San Pedro, California
and at Honolulu, Hawaii
, where a light schedule of duties included inspecting aircraft at Pearl Harbor
.
The New Deal
and the National Cancer Act of 1937 transformed public health, and Scheele's career. Reassigned to Washington, DC during 1936, Scheele came to the attention of then-Surgeon General Thomas Parran, Jr.
and one of his top lieutenants, Joseph Mountin, who choose Scheele to join a new Division of Public Health Methods. After a brief field assignment in public health administration (Acting County Health Officer, Queen Anne's County, Maryland
), Scheele was sent by Mountin for clinical training (1937-1939) in New York
City at the Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases (now the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
). On his return, Scheele served as officer-in-charge of the new National Cancer Control Program.
He spent World War II
on assignment to the military. Days after the attack on Pearl Harbor
, Scheele was dispatched to the Medical Division of the Federal Office of Civilian Defense, under New York
Mayor
Fiorello H. LaGuardia
. From 1943 through 1945 he was detailed to the Medical Department of the Army where he earned the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and specialized in health-related governance in occupied territories. Following service in Italy
and Africa
, Scheele arrived in London
in early 1944, where he led the Preventive Medicine Section of the Public Health Branch, Medical Division of the G-5 Division at the Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Force. Scheele closed out the war as director of the Health, Welfare, Education and Religion Division of the Allied Control Council in Berlin
and received the U.S. Typhus Medal for his work in Germany
.
(NCI) (1946), he oversaw a new program of grants-in-aid to the states for cancer control work in the areas of biology
, biochemistry
, biophysics
, chemotherapy
, epidemiology
, and pathology
. Scheele's skilled diplomacy before the United States Congress
in the spring of 1947 netted the National Institute of Health (NIH) a fourteenfold increase in budget appropriation. He was elevated to Director of NCI and Associate Director of NIH (1947), the latter a position created for him.
Scheele served as Surgeon General first under a Democratic President
, Harry S. Truman
, who appointed Scheele as Surgeon General Parran's successor on April 6, 1948, and 4 years later under a Republican, President Dwight D. Eisenhower
, his former commander during the war. Scheele built on his wartime experience and carried on PHS's leadership in international health, leading the U.S. delegations to the World Health Assembly
(1949 through 1953) and serving twice as President of the World Health Organization.
But the domestic scene occupied the lion's share of his energies. Together with the philanthropists Albert
and Mary Lasker
and voluntary health organizations like the American Cancer Society
, Scheele worked closely with enthusiastic supporters in Congress to bring biomedical research fully into the fold of public health practice. NCI provided a working model, and a categorical approach organized about specific diseases became the means. Legislation enacted during 1948 made NIH into a plural "Institutes" by adding a National Heart Institute, the National Institute of Dental Research, the National Microbiological Institute (predecessor to the Allergy and Infectious Diseases Institute), and the National Institute of Experimental Biology and Medicine (renamed the National Institute of Arthritis and Metabolic Diseases in 1950), followed by the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Blindness (1950) and a 500-bed Clinical Center to link bench research with patient care (1953). Lay representation on national advisory councils, construction grants for laboratories, and extramural research grants each contributed to the growing scientific and institutional authority of NIH.
Scheele also inherited projects begun before 1941, whose formal implementation had been delayed by the war, including the transfer of the Interior Department
's health bureau for American Indians
(1954), the transfer of the Department of Defense
's Armed Forces Medical Library (1956, renamed the National Library of Medicine), and new programs to control water pollution (1948), ionizing radiation (1948), and air pollution (1955).
Scheele's administrative skills helped PHS weather two public controversies that dominated 1950s America: fluoridation
of public drinking water supplies and outbreaks of polio that followed a government-sanctioned vaccination
campaign. These issues highlighted the importance of political consensus and public acceptance in evaluating the costs and benefits of public health interventions. Following decades of research and the success of a 1945 clinical trial involving Grand Rapids, Michigan
school children, PHS gave formal support to fluoridation as of June 1950, and Scheele issued his public, unqualified recommendation on April 24, 1951, enhancing PHS's public credibility and further elevating the role of the Surgeon General as a spokesperson for health.
On the other hand, controversy surrounding failed batches of polio vaccine
threatened to destroy public faith in the Federal health establishment. After the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis sponsored a successful national trial of Jonas Salk
's vaccine in Ann Arbor, Michigan
(1954), PHS had released licensing standards for the vaccine and approved six manufacturers to begin production. Scheele and Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (DHEW) Secretary Oveta Culp Hobby
released this long-awaited news at a press conference on April 12, 1955, the tenth anniversary of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's death. Health departments around the country administered over 10 million doses, 90 percent to elementary school-aged children, until weeks into the public health campaign, reports came in of fresh cases among vaccinated children and their contacts. Amid growing public furor, Scheele took action. On April 27 he requested that one of the manufacturers, Cutter Laboratories
, recall its vaccine and he created a new Poliomyelitis Surveillance Unit at the Communicable Disease Center (CDC) and a national infrastructure for case reporting from the states. During May Scheele halted the national campaign until the remaining vaccines were cleared. Relative scarcity of the vaccine created public health crises of another sort: most vaccinations were held off until autumn, giving CDC time enough to evaluate the revised safety regulations but also leading to a political falling out between Hobby and the United States Congress
.
. As a private sector executive, he continued to serve his country, for example, travelling to Cuba
on behalf of the John F. Kennedy
Administration, to arrange for the transfer of millions of dollars of medicines, public health and food supplies in exchange for the release of hostages taken during the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion
. After his retirement from Warner-Lambert, Scheele returned to the Washington, D.C.
, where he died on 8 January 1993.
Surgeon General of the United States
The Surgeon General of the United States is the operational head of the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and thus the leading spokesperson on matters of public health in the federal government...
from 1948 to 1956.
Early years
Scheele was born in Fort Wayne, IndianaFort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne is a city in the US state of Indiana and the county seat of Allen County. The population was 253,691 at the 2010 Census making it the 74th largest city in the United States and the second largest in Indiana...
. While in high school, he worked in his father's pharmacy
Pharmacy
Pharmacy is the health profession that links the health sciences with the chemical sciences and it is charged with ensuring the safe and effective use of pharmaceutical drugs...
and planned to enter medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
. For his undergraduate education, Scheele chose the University of Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
(B.A.
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
, 1931) over Indiana University
Indiana University Bloomington
Indiana University Bloomington is a public research university located in Bloomington, Indiana, in the United States. IU Bloomington is the flagship campus of the Indiana University system. Being the flagship campus, IU Bloomington is often referred to simply as IU or Indiana...
, citing the former's medical reputation but ended up following his future spouse, then a dental
Dentistry
Dentistry is the branch of medicine that is involved in the study, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of diseases, disorders and conditions of the oral cavity, maxillofacial area and the adjacent and associated structures and their impact on the human body. Dentistry is widely considered...
student, to Detroit. He received his M.D.
Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
in 1934 from the Detroit College of Medicine and Surgery (now the Wayne State University School of Medicine
Wayne State University School of Medicine
The Wayne State University School of Medicine is the largest single-campus medical school in the United States with more than 1,000 medical students. In addition to undergraduate medical education, the school offers master’s degree, Ph.D., and M.D.-Ph.D. programs in 14 areas of basic science to...
).
Career
Scheele graduated at the height of the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
. Inspired by one of his medical school professors, who taught preventive medicine
Preventive medicine
Preventive medicine or preventive care refers to measures taken to prevent diseases, rather than curing them or treating their symptoms...
and directed the laboratories at the Michigan State Health Department, Scheele followed up on a recruitment visit by Public Health Service (PHS) officers from Detroit's Marine Hospital. Encouraged by his school's dean, he competed successfully for an internship at Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
's Marine Hospital (1933-1934). Once Scheele accepted a commission as an Assistant Surgeon
Surgery
Surgery is an ancient medical specialty that uses operative manual and instrumental techniques on a patient to investigate and/or treat a pathological condition such as disease or injury, or to help improve bodily function or appearance.An act of performing surgery may be called a surgical...
(July 2, 1934), he began a series of rotations at quarantine
Quarantine
Quarantine is compulsory isolation, typically to contain the spread of something considered dangerous, often but not always disease. The word comes from the Italian quarantena, meaning forty-day period....
stations, in San Francisco and San Pedro, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
and at Honolulu, Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...
, where a light schedule of duties included inspecting aircraft at Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
.
The New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
and the National Cancer Act of 1937 transformed public health, and Scheele's career. Reassigned to Washington, DC during 1936, Scheele came to the attention of then-Surgeon General Thomas Parran, Jr.
Thomas Parran, Jr.
Thomas Parran, Jr. was an American physician and Public Health Service officer. He was appointed the sixth Surgeon General of the United States from 1936 to 1948.-Early years :...
and one of his top lieutenants, Joseph Mountin, who choose Scheele to join a new Division of Public Health Methods. After a brief field assignment in public health administration (Acting County Health Officer, Queen Anne's County, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
), Scheele was sent by Mountin for clinical training (1937-1939) in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
City at the Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases (now the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center is a cancer treatment and research institution founded in 1884 as the New York Cancer Hospital...
). On his return, Scheele served as officer-in-charge of the new National Cancer Control Program.
He spent World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
on assignment to the military. Days after the attack on Pearl Harbor
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941...
, Scheele was dispatched to the Medical Division of the Federal Office of Civilian Defense, under New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
Mayor
Mayor
In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
Fiorello H. LaGuardia
Fiorello H. LaGuardia
Fiorello Henry LaGuardia was Mayor of New York for three terms from 1934 to 1945 as a liberal Republican. Previously he was elected to Congress in 1916 and 1918, and again from 1922 through 1930. Irascible, energetic and charismatic, he craved publicity and is acclaimed as one of the three or...
. From 1943 through 1945 he was detailed to the Medical Department of the Army where he earned the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and specialized in health-related governance in occupied territories. Following service in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
and Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
, Scheele arrived in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
in early 1944, where he led the Preventive Medicine Section of the Public Health Branch, Medical Division of the G-5 Division at the Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Force. Scheele closed out the war as director of the Health, Welfare, Education and Religion Division of the Allied Control Council in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and received the U.S. Typhus Medal for his work in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
.
Surgeon General
After the war, Scheele moved quickly up the ranks to Surgeon General. Promoted to Surgeon and appointed Assistant Chief of the National Cancer InstituteNational Cancer Institute
The National Cancer Institute is part of the National Institutes of Health , which is one of 11 agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The NCI coordinates the U.S...
(NCI) (1946), he oversaw a new program of grants-in-aid to the states for cancer control work in the areas of biology
Biology
Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...
, biochemistry
Biochemistry
Biochemistry, sometimes called biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes in living organisms, including, but not limited to, living matter. Biochemistry governs all living organisms and living processes...
, biophysics
Biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that uses the methods of physical science to study biological systems. Studies included under the branches of biophysics span all levels of biological organization, from the molecular scale to whole organisms and ecosystems...
, chemotherapy
Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is the treatment of cancer with an antineoplastic drug or with a combination of such drugs into a standardized treatment regimen....
, epidemiology
Epidemiology
Epidemiology is the study of health-event, health-characteristic, or health-determinant patterns in a population. It is the cornerstone method of public health research, and helps inform policy decisions and evidence-based medicine by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive...
, and pathology
Pathology
Pathology is the precise study and diagnosis of disease. The word pathology is from Ancient Greek , pathos, "feeling, suffering"; and , -logia, "the study of". Pathologization, to pathologize, refers to the process of defining a condition or behavior as pathological, e.g. pathological gambling....
. Scheele's skilled diplomacy before the United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
in the spring of 1947 netted the National Institute of Health (NIH) a fourteenfold increase in budget appropriation. He was elevated to Director of NCI and Associate Director of NIH (1947), the latter a position created for him.
Scheele served as Surgeon General first under a Democratic President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
, Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...
, who appointed Scheele as Surgeon General Parran's successor on April 6, 1948, and 4 years later under a Republican, President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...
, his former commander during the war. Scheele built on his wartime experience and carried on PHS's leadership in international health, leading the U.S. delegations to the World Health Assembly
World Health Assembly
The World Health Assembly is the forum through which the World Health Organization is governed by its 194 member states. It is the world's highest health policy setting body and is composed of health ministers from member states....
(1949 through 1953) and serving twice as President of the World Health Organization.
But the domestic scene occupied the lion's share of his energies. Together with the philanthropists Albert
Albert Lasker
Albert Davis Lasker was an American businessman who is often considered to be the founder of modern advertising. He was born in Freiburg, Germany when his American parents Morris and Nettie Heidenheimer Davis Lasker were visiting their homeland; he was raised in Galveston, Texas, where Morris was...
and Mary Lasker
Mary Lasker
Mary Woodard Lasker was an American health activist. She worked to raise funds for medical research, and founded the Lasker Foundation....
and voluntary health organizations like the American Cancer Society
American Cancer Society
The American Cancer Society is the "nationwide community-based voluntary health organization" dedicated, in their own words, "to eliminating cancer as a major health problem by preventing cancer, saving lives, and diminishing suffering from cancer, through research, education, advocacy, and...
, Scheele worked closely with enthusiastic supporters in Congress to bring biomedical research fully into the fold of public health practice. NCI provided a working model, and a categorical approach organized about specific diseases became the means. Legislation enacted during 1948 made NIH into a plural "Institutes" by adding a National Heart Institute, the National Institute of Dental Research, the National Microbiological Institute (predecessor to the Allergy and Infectious Diseases Institute), and the National Institute of Experimental Biology and Medicine (renamed the National Institute of Arthritis and Metabolic Diseases in 1950), followed by the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Blindness (1950) and a 500-bed Clinical Center to link bench research with patient care (1953). Lay representation on national advisory councils, construction grants for laboratories, and extramural research grants each contributed to the growing scientific and institutional authority of NIH.
Scheele also inherited projects begun before 1941, whose formal implementation had been delayed by the war, including the transfer of the Interior Department
United States Department of the Interior
The United States Department of the Interior is the United States federal executive department of the U.S. government responsible for the management and conservation of most federal land and natural resources, and the administration of programs relating to Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native...
's health bureau for American Indians
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
(1954), the transfer of the Department of Defense
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...
's Armed Forces Medical Library (1956, renamed the National Library of Medicine), and new programs to control water pollution (1948), ionizing radiation (1948), and air pollution (1955).
Scheele's administrative skills helped PHS weather two public controversies that dominated 1950s America: fluoridation
Water fluoridation
Water fluoridation is the controlled addition of fluoride to a public water supply to reduce tooth decay. Fluoridated water has fluoride at a level that is effective for preventing cavities; this can occur naturally or by adding fluoride...
of public drinking water supplies and outbreaks of polio that followed a government-sanctioned vaccination
Vaccination
Vaccination is the administration of antigenic material to stimulate the immune system of an individual to develop adaptive immunity to a disease. Vaccines can prevent or ameliorate the effects of infection by many pathogens...
campaign. These issues highlighted the importance of political consensus and public acceptance in evaluating the costs and benefits of public health interventions. Following decades of research and the success of a 1945 clinical trial involving Grand Rapids, Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
school children, PHS gave formal support to fluoridation as of June 1950, and Scheele issued his public, unqualified recommendation on April 24, 1951, enhancing PHS's public credibility and further elevating the role of the Surgeon General as a spokesperson for health.
On the other hand, controversy surrounding failed batches of polio vaccine
Polio vaccine
Two polio vaccines are used throughout the world to combat poliomyelitis . The first was developed by Jonas Salk and first tested in 1952. Announced to the world by Salk on April 12, 1955, it consists of an injected dose of inactivated poliovirus. An oral vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin...
threatened to destroy public faith in the Federal health establishment. After the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis sponsored a successful national trial of Jonas Salk
Jonas Salk
Jonas Edward Salk was an American medical researcher and virologist, best known for his discovery and development of the first safe and effective polio vaccine. He was born in New York City to parents from Ashkenazi Jewish Russian immigrant families...
's vaccine in Ann Arbor, Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
(1954), PHS had released licensing standards for the vaccine and approved six manufacturers to begin production. Scheele and Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (DHEW) Secretary Oveta Culp Hobby
Oveta Culp Hobby
Oveta Culp Hobby was the first secretary of the US Department of Health, Education and Welfare, first commanding officer of the Women's Army Corps, and chairman of the board of the Houston Post....
released this long-awaited news at a press conference on April 12, 1955, the tenth anniversary of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's death. Health departments around the country administered over 10 million doses, 90 percent to elementary school-aged children, until weeks into the public health campaign, reports came in of fresh cases among vaccinated children and their contacts. Amid growing public furor, Scheele took action. On April 27 he requested that one of the manufacturers, Cutter Laboratories
Cutter Laboratories
Cutter Laboratories was a pharmaceutical company located in Berkeley, California. They were bought by the Bayer pharmaceutical company in the 1970s.-The Cutter incident:...
, recall its vaccine and he created a new Poliomyelitis Surveillance Unit at the Communicable Disease Center (CDC) and a national infrastructure for case reporting from the states. During May Scheele halted the national campaign until the remaining vaccines were cleared. Relative scarcity of the vaccine created public health crises of another sort: most vaccinations were held off until autumn, giving CDC time enough to evaluate the revised safety regulations but also leading to a political falling out between Hobby and the United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
.
Later life
The following August (1956) Scheele resigned from his post as Surgeon General, to become President of Warner-Chilcott Laboratories, then part of the Warner-Lambert Company of Summit, New JerseySummit, New Jersey
Summit is a city in Union County, New Jersey, United States. At the 2010 United States Census, the city's population was 21,457. Summit had the 16th-highest per capita income in the state as of the 2000 Census....
. As a private sector executive, he continued to serve his country, for example, travelling to Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
on behalf of the John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
Administration, to arrange for the transfer of millions of dollars of medicines, public health and food supplies in exchange for the release of hostages taken during the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion
Bay of Pigs Invasion
The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an unsuccessful action by a CIA-trained force of Cuban exiles to invade southern Cuba, with support and encouragement from the US government, in an attempt to overthrow the Cuban government of Fidel Castro. The invasion was launched in April 1961, less than three months...
. After his retirement from Warner-Lambert, Scheele returned to the Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, where he died on 8 January 1993.