Hanns Martin Seitz was born on May 7, 1938, attended the Wittelsbach Gymnasium in Munich and began his medical studies there in 1957. He successfully completed his studies in 1964 and graduated as Doctor medicinae with the grade sum ma cum laude. Initially, he worked for four years under the supervision of Prof. Bachmann in the Institute of Histology and Experimental Biology at the University of Munich. He continued his education as a scholarship holder of the German National Academic Foundation at Tulane University, New Orleans, where he obtained the degree of Master of Public Health and Tropical Medicine.
After returning from the usa, he completed two years of medical residency at the district hospitals of Simbach/Inn and Altötting and was licensed as a physician in 1967. He worked at the Institute of Tropical Medicine at the University of Tübingen and habilitated there in 1975 with the work "Plasmodium berghei infection in isogenic mice: studies on the immunology of rodent malaria". He spent further research periods at the Immunology Research and Training Center of the who in Nairobi, where he worked on the immunology of schistosomiasis, at the Institut Pasteur in Lille, and in Nigeria.
On July 1, 1980, Professor Seitz took over the Chair of Medical Parasitology at the University of Bonn as successor to Professor Piekarski. Already in his inaugural lecture, one of Professor Seitz's many strengths became apparent: He was a gifted university lecturer who always inspired his audience with vivid, engaging, humorous and exciting lectures. In addition to his scientific work primarily in the fields of echinococcosis, malaria, trypanosomiasis and schistosomiasis, Professor Seitz devoted himself with untiring zeal to the diagnosis of infectious diseases, naturally above all parasitoses. His goal was to provide exemplary, best possible care for patients; in addition to indirect care through outstanding diagnostics, he also ran a special outpatient clinic.
Admirable, in addition to his extensive knowledge and skills in the profession, was Professor Seitz's remarkable general education and broad interest in many subjects. Among his hobbies were the cultivation of orchids - he also had remarkable expertise in botany - and Japanese art.
The education of young physicians in the field of parasitology was a special concern to which Professor Seitz devoted much time and commitment. Here, too, his special didactic talent and his ability to facilitate the learning of even the most complex contexts by interweaving them with anecdotes and vivid stories had an extremely beneficial effect.
Professor Seitz served the High Faculty of Medicine as Dean from 1987 to 1988; he was also Vice-Rector and Chairman of the Commission for Research and Young Scientists from the winter semester of 1992/93 to the end of the summer semester of 1994. He also mastered these tasks with flying colors.
The students, the staff of the Institute for Medical Microbiology, Immunology and Parasitology, which resulted from the merger of the Institutes for Medical Parasitology and for Medical Microbiology and Immunology, and all employees of the clinics and institutes of the University Hospital Bonn will always remember Professor Hanns Martin Seitz with pleasure and will always honor his memory. Our sympathy goes to his wife Friederike Seitz and the two sons and six grandchildren of the couple.