In Sri Lanka, an icon is no more. A reputed persona grata of eminence, a teacher who lit up the field of paediatric healthcare, emeritus professor of paediatrics, Deshamanya Priyani Elizabeth Soysa, died on 7 April 2023. The 97 years that she spent on this planet are of seminal significance for the services she provided in caring for children.
Young Priyani Elizabeth De Mel had excelled as a bright star at her alma mater, Princess of Wales College in Moratuwa, Sri Lanka. Then her meteoric sojourn as a student in the Colombo Faculty of Medicine culminating in first class honours in the final MBBS Examination, was the forerunner to a dedicated career in her academic pursuits. An acclaimed clinician and a researcher of repute, she functioned as a paediatrician in various parts of the country, including Jaffna. Then, she became the first woman in Sri Lanka to be appointed to a professorial chair of any discipline, when she succeeded Professor C. C. de Silva. She was the chair professor of paediatrics for 25 years before retiring in 1991.
She is well-recognised for many a battle that she fought, virtually in a single-handed dedication towards the welfare of little children. When she assumed duties as the chair professor, paediatrics was just a part of adult medicine in the Colombo Faculty of Medicine. She converted paediatrics into a separate subject in its own right, which was tested in the Final MBBS Examination.
Professor Soysa had an abiding interest in childhood nutrition. Long before the current scientific evidence on proper nutrition emerged, she fought a valiant skirmish to ensure proper nutrition for children. Malnutrition was rampant in the country at that time, and she became an unwavering advocate of exclusive breastfeeding of all babies for the first six months of life. In that endeavour, she fought a lone but heroic fight against the might of the infant formula food manufacturers. Formula milk was the fashion of the Western world, and it was no mean task to fight against the Western manufacturers of infant foods. Professor Soysa declared all-out war on them and their subtle efforts at jeopardising exclusive breastfeeding initiatives. She worked hard to change the mindset of Sri Lankan mothers from bottle feeding to breastfeeding. This was such a great achievement, as at that time breastfeeding was not considered to be ‘fashionable.’ As the undisputed champion of exclusive breastfeeding, Professor Soysa also played a major role in securing maternity leave for working mothers, and that effort tipped the balance against the infant milk food industry most decisively. The fact that today we have an over 90 per cent rate of exclusive breastfeeding in the first six months of life of babies is an eternal testimony to her work as the undisputed winner of that initiative.
Professor Priyani Soysa is a past president of the Sri Lanka Paediatric Association (now the Sri Lanka College of Paediatricians), the Sri Lanka Medical Association and the Sri Lanka Association for the Advancement of Science. As a gesture of genuine appreciation, the Sri Lanka Medical Association, the oldest medical organisation in Asia and Australasia, awarded her the Honorary Life Membership during its 125th Anniversary celebrations in 2012. In grateful recognition of her services to the country, the government of Sri Lanka bestowed on her the coveted national honour of Deshamanya in a glittering investiture ceremony at Nelum Pokuna Theatre in 2017, attended and presided over by the Executive President of Sri Lanka.
In addition to being a splendid academic, Professor Soysa was a marvellous family person, devoted to her husband, the reputed ENT Surgeon Deshabandu Dr Ananda Soysa, who predeceased her in 2019. They have four daughters, Dharini, Chandini, Keshini and Thilina, to whom Madam Priyani was an exemplary mother. Those who have had the privilege of being at a meal in the Soysa household would vouch for the abilities of Professor Priyani Soysa as an accomplished chef as well.
Many of us have learnt the basics of paediatrics from her. But then, what we learnt from her goes even further than that. As a personal anecdote, I know for sure how she responded to a problem that I and my allocated working partner had with a family that was assigned to us for the social paediatrics appointment when we were doing the professorial paediatric appointment as her students. That family was so poor that they lived a frugal hand-to-mouth existence. We noticed that they did not have a toilet. When the good professor was grilling us during discussions that involved a large group of medical students, I was forced to tell the professor that the lack of a toilet was the least of their problems, as they did not know where the next meal was coming from. The professor did not say anything, but later we found that she had used her personal funds to build a toilet for that family. She had done it anonymously. It just went to show that beneath her professorial, strict façade, there was a very kind heart that was full of empathy for humans.
We saw her for the last time on the 10th of April when we attended her last rites and were honoured and greatly privileged to join her in her last journey on earth.
As a student and a mentee of hers, I know that she will always be remembered as an unmatched game-changer in the paediatric scenario. Professor Priyani Soysa will stay in our hearts forever.
B J C Perera
This obituary was originally published in the Sri Lanka Journal of Child Health and The Island, and is republished here with the kind permission of Dr B J C Perera.