International Nurses Day is celebrated on 12 May, the birth anniversary of:

International Nurses Day is celebrated every year on 12 May, the birth anniversary of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing.

About International Nurses Day:

It is organised by the International Council of Nurses (ICN), which has celebrated it since 1965. The date of 12 May was chosen in 1974.

It recognises the contributions of nurses to health care and society, and each year has a theme.

The year 2020, the 200th anniversary of Nightingale's birth, was declared the "International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife" by the World Health Organization.

About Florence Nightingale (1820-1910):

• She was born on 12 May 1820 in Florence, Italy, to a wealthy British family, and was named after the city of her birth.
• She trained as a nurse in Germany, at Kaiserswerth, against the wishes of her family.
• During the Crimean War (1853-1856), she led a team of 38 nurses to the British military hospital at Scutari (in present-day Istanbul, Turkey) in 1854.
• She greatly improved hygiene, sanitation and care, and reduced the death rate among wounded soldiers.
• She became known as "The Lady with the Lamp" because she made rounds at night carrying a lamp.

She was also a pioneer of statistics. She used a type of pie chart called the "polar area diagram" (or "coxcomb") to show the causes of soldiers' deaths. She was the first woman elected a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society (1858).

In 1860, she founded the Nightingale Training School for Nurses at St Thomas' Hospital, London, the first professional nursing school.

She wrote "Notes on Nursing" (1859).

She was also interested in public health in India and campaigned for better sanitation in the British army in India.

She received the Order of Merit in 1907, the first woman to do so.

Honours in her name:

• The Florence Nightingale Medal is awarded by the International Committee of the Red Cross.
• In India, the National Florence Nightingale Award is presented by the President of India to nurses for excellent service.

Other related figures:

• Clara Barton: founder of the American Red Cross (1881).
• Mary Seacole: a Jamaican-British nurse who also served in the Crimean War.
• Mother Teresa: founder of the Missionaries of Charity.

Why not the other options?

• ✗Mother Teresa founded the Missionaries of Charity.
• ✗Clara Barton founded the American Red Cross.
• ✗Mary Seacole also nursed soldiers in the Crimean War.