Staff Picks Masked Hero: How We Lien-teh Invented the Mask that Ended an Epidemic by Dr. Shan Woo Liu and Kaili Liu Gormley

Masked Hero: How We Lien-teh Invented the Mask that Ended an Epidemic by Dr. Shan Woo Liu and Kaili Liu Gormley; Illustrated by Lisa Wee

In 2020, N95 masks protected people from spreading the COVID-19 virus to others. Did you know that the earliest version of the N95 mask was invented over one hundred years ago in China to help control the spread of a pneumonic plague?

During the recent pandemic, Dr. Shan Woo Liu, an emergency medicine physician, realised that the N95 mask she wore while helping patients in Massachusetts General Hospital was designed like the one invented by her grandfather, Dr. Wu Lien-teh. Dr. Shan Woo Liu wrote this book to share her grandfather’s story. 

Alicia Cavitt
Information Specialist