Louis Bloom Cohen spent much of his career as a surgeon in various politically unstable countries in Africa and in Iran. He was born in Glasgow on 16 November 1915, the son of Arthur Israel Cohen, a company director with the Rank Organisation, and Louise née Bloom. He was educated at St Paul's School, London, where he won first prize in science in the seventh form. He studied medicine at St Mary's Hospital, qualifying in 1940. In June 1941 he joined the Navy as a Surgeon Lieutenant, seeing service on *HMS Newark*, *Whitehaven*, *Aldenham* and *Eggesford* in the North Atlantic, eastern Mediterranean and in the Far East. He was demobilised in January 1946. He was a member of the RNVR for a further six years. He was a surgical registrar at St Mary's from 1946 to 1949. He was then a resident surgical officer at Salisbury Infirmary, Wiltshire. From 1951 to 1952 he was a surgical registrar at North Middlesex Hospital. In 1952 he went to Ethiopia, as a surgeon at the Princess Tsehai Memorial Hospital, Addis Ababa, where he stayed for three years. From 1955 to 1963 he was in private practice in Nairobi, Kenya, with beds in the Princess Elizabeth Hospital. The war of independence led to the break up of his medical firm. In 1963 he moved to Nigeria, as surgeon to the Shell-BP Delta Clinic, Port Harcourt, but had to leave quickly, along with other expatriates, because of the civil war. From 1968 to 1972 he was chief surgeon at the National Iranian Oil Company Hospital, Abadan, Iran. He was appointed by London University to chair a proposed university, but the scheme was abandoned because of political pressure. In 1972, he was appointed professor of the faculty of postgraduate studies at JundiShapur University Hospital, where he stayed for a year, but was forced to leave after the radical student element burned down the administrative building and he narrowly escaped a lynching. He returned to Africa in 1973, as a surgeon at the Zambia Medical Aid Society Hospital, Lusaka. The hospital was closed for political reasons, with the government attempting to force the medical staff and patients to transfer to the Lusaka Teaching Hospital. He went on to South Africa in 1975, where he was full-time senior surgeon at the Provincial Hospital, Port Elizabeth. He retired for the first time in 1983, and then worked at the Nkensani, Letaba and Kgapani Hospitals. He finally retired in April 1995. He had attempted to retire to Famagusta in Cyprus, but the Turks invaded the Greek part of Cyprus and his property was seized. He married three times - to Valerie Holmes, Sjoukje Veenstra and Norma Hammond. He had two children, Patricia Louise and David Jared. He enjoyed boxing (representing the United Hospitals at welter and middle weight as a student), golf, swimming, painting and model making. He died suddenly of a heart attack on 9 September 2003.