Pharmacy in Basel

Abstract

The production of pharmaceuticals is one of the foundations of the economy and financial stability of the Basel region. Pharmacy and the city of Basel have been synonymous, and historically entwined, for a considerable time. Probably no other city in the world displays a higher density of pharmaceutical industry. The historic origins of these developments stem from far back in the Middle Ages. However, the past two hundred years have transformed our medical and pharmaceutical sciences tremendously, and this progress has made deep impressions upon Basel's industry. The predominant sources and currents that have influenced the foundation and development of the Basel pharmaceutical industry are described in this article. The histories of pharmacy and medicine are definitively connected, and neither subject can be properly understood without the awareness of the relationship between the two. Pharmacy and medicine were affected by diverse cultural influences and sociological changes, and further by profound advances in the natural sciences and the resultant technological discoveries. Today's pharmaceutical industry in Basel is a living illustration of the combined complexity of a distant historical past and the technological present working together towards the future.