What's in a Prague street name

Originally published on Twitter on 5 October 2022.

U Vinohradské nemocnice was built in 1925 and translates as ‘By Vinohrady Hospital’.

What is now known as the University Hospital of Královské Vinohrady (Fakultní nemocnice Královské Vinohrady) was opened in 1902, and, a year later, was named ‘Všeobecná veřejná nemocnice císaře a krále Františka Josefa’. Catchy.

I obviously couldn’t fit an English translation of that into the previous tweet, so here you go now: General Public Hospital of Emperor and King Franz Joseph I, Vinohrady and Žižkov District.

After Charles University set up its Faculty of Medicine in 1953, the hospital became a place to teach students.

Not particularly up-to-date data suggest 2,500 employees, almost 1,300 beds and about 50,000 patients per year.

The most famous recent name associated with the hospital is probably Petr Arenberger, who was the hospital’s director from October 2019 until January 2022, but was also one of the 3,297,536 health ministers that the Czech Republic had in 2020 and 2021.

In his less than two months in office, Arenberger had to announce he hadn’t been an StB agent, appeared to be a Sputnik fan, and came under fire for dissolving the Covid advisory group which had been critical of the government’s policies.

A tabloid dream, but nobody else’s.

And then, alleged irregularities concerning property declarations came up. After 49 days, it was announced that it was time for Adam Vojtěch: The Return (now with added vaccinations).

This all happened about 18 months ago and it feels like a different lifetime.

Arenberger claims he was dismissed from his position as director of the hospital by current Health Minister Vlastimil Válek in January 2022 *after* (and because) he gave in his resignation.

Válek does not: https://www.seznamzpravy.cz/clanek/domaci-politika-exministr-arenberger-konci-jako-reditel-vinohradske-nemocnice-186422