Giovanni Borromeo

Giovanni Borromeo (Rome, December 15, 1898 – Rome, August 24, 1961) was an Italian physician. In 2004 Yad Vashem recognized him as a “Righteous among the Nations” for saving five members of the Almagià and extended family (Clotilde and Gina Almagià, Luciana Tedesco, Claudio Tedesco, Gabriella Ajo). Borromeo had been a student and assistant of Marco Almajà, a highly respected professor of physiopathology at the University of Rome. Early life Giovanni Borromeo was the son of the well known physician, Pietro Borromeo. While studying medicine at the University of Rome, he was drafted in World War I. Upon his return he earned a bronze medal. At age 22, Borromeo received his degree in medicine. According to his son, in 1931 he was appointed director of the "Ospedali Riuniti di Roma" but was banned from accepting the position because he was not a member of the Fascist Party. This claim has never been substantiated by evidence. On December 2, 1933, Borromeo married Maria Adelaide Mangani. They had 3 children: Beatrice (1934), Pietro (1937) and Maria Cristina (1943). Career In 1934, he was appointed director of the Ospedale Fatebenefratelli on the Tiberina Island downtown Rome. He and Prior Maurizio Bialek, continued the renovation that the hospital had begun in 1922 transforming an old medical hospice into a modern and efficient infrastructure. The Fatebenefratelli was considered an extraterritorial zone, since it belonged to the Hospitaller Order of Saint John of God that had purchased it in 1892 from the Kingdom of Italy and made it part of its worldwide chain of hospitals.