MOSCATI, GIUSEPPE. - Physician, b. in Benevento on 25 July 1880, d. in Naples on 12 Apr. 1927. At the age of 17 he made a vow of perpetual chastity; he embraced the medical career with the sole purpose of glorifying the Lord in it and saving souls. Having obtained his degree with highest honors in 1903, he was immediately appointed extraordinary coadjutor of the United Hospitals of Naples.
In cases of public calamity, as during the Vesuvian eruption of 1906, in which he extracted the elderly patients from the rubble and brought them to safety in the hospice of Torre del Greco, and during the cholera epidemic of 1911, he was always at his post, even when other colleagues were absent, bearing with heroic self-denial the most difficult tasks, in the most afflicted zones of the city. In 1911 he became chief physician at the Incurabili and lecturer in physiological chemistry at the University; from there he passed as full professor to the United Hospitals; in 1919 he was elected full professor of clinical chemistry at the University; in 1922 he obtained a new libera docenza in general medical clinic. By government appointment he took part in the international medical congresses of Budapest (1911) and Edinburgh (1923).
Gifted with extraordinary diagnostic acumen, he treated his patients with particular skill and charity, striving to cure their infirmities with the least financial burden, so much so that he often came to refuse any compensation and to provide the money for the purchase of remedies, and to bring them back to the faith and the practice of the Christian life. He gave students every care to form them well for their future profession. Of deep spiritual life, M. always demonstrated before everyone his faith with pride and joy, winning over to Christian practice colleagues, pupils and patients.
As he had foreseen and announced, he died on 12 Apr. 1927. Since 1930 his body has been transferred to the church of the Gesù Nuovo, in Naples, and many prodigious healings are attributed to his intercession; his cause of beatification was introduced in 1949.
Among his works, 32 scientific publications.
Bibliography3 works
Arnaldo M. Lanz