Praise them with great praise

You've heard of Alexander Fleming, the discoverer of penicillin. But have you ever heard of Howard Florey and Ernst Chain?

Florey (Australian) and Chain (German) are credited with advancing humanity's knowledge of penicillin's infection fighting abilities (source: http://www.timelinescience.org/resource/students/pencilin/fl_ch_pr.htm). Though a great many valiant mice died as a result of their experiments, we can thank Chain for having the most interest and initiative in testing penicillin's properties. We can thank Florey for figuring out ways to make the production of penicillin more prolific, spurred on by the massive need created by World War II.

Though I am allergic to penicillin, I still owe my gratitude to Florey and Chain for making the wide array of antibiotics we have today, like the one I'm taking currently for my now barely noticeable throat infection, possible.

What did people do before the invention of the antibiotic? Well, they often died. But what awful, horrible deaths they must have been! When I think about the times in my life when I've experienced real, oh-my-god-this-hurts-so-bad pain, it's been related to infections. Some pretty awful throat and ear infections come to mind. Bacterial infections just knock me out - and antibiotics, in a relatively short time, just do wonders for me. I've only been on my antibiotic for 5 days, and after the 3rd day I was feeling mostly back to normal. That is nothing short of a miracle. Not of biblical proportions, no, but amazing nonetheless.

So great praise to Florey and Chain!