BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY : AFRO-BRITISH " BARON BERNARD RIBEIRO " IS A BRITISH SURGEON WHO SERVED AS PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEON FROM 2005 TO 2008 : GOES INTO THE " HALL OF BLACK HEROES "

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 Bernard Ribeiro, Baron Ribeiro

Bernard Francisco Ribeiro, Baron Ribeiro, CBE (born 20 January 1944), is a British surgeon who served as President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 2005 to 2008. He was created a life peer in 2010 and sits in the House of Lords on the Conservative benches.^[1][2][3]

Biography

Born in 1944 in Achimota in the Gold Coast (now Ghana), Bernard Ribeiro was educated at Dean Close School, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, and at Middlesex Hospital Medical School.

Ribeiro qualified as a doctor at Middlesex Medical School in 1967 and then specialised in surgery, five years later being awarded Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons(FRCS). From 1979 until his retirement in April 2008, he was consultant general surgeon at Basildon Hospital with a special interest in urology and colorectal surgery, pioneering the use of invasive keyhole surgery,^[3] and helping to establish the Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust's advanced laparoscopic unit. He was elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1998. In 2008 he was awarded the Honorary degree of Doctor of Science by Anglia Ruskin University.^[4]Also in 2008 he received an Honorary Fellowship from the American College of Surgeons.^[5]

In the 2004 New Year Honours he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to medicine,^[6] and was appointed Knight Bachelor in the2009 New Years Honours.^[7][8] He was created a Life Peer on 20 December 2010, as Baron Ribeiro, of Achimota in the Republic of Ghana and of Ovington in the County ofHampshire.^[9]

In 2012, Lord Ribeiro was confirmed as Chair of the Department of Health's Independent Reconfiguration Panel, advising the Secretary of State for Health on changes to local health services in England.^[10] He serves as Master of the Worshipful Company of Barbers for 2013-14.