John Henry Bell MRCS (1832 – 9 September 1906) was a British medical doctor and researcher who is best known for contributing to the study of anthrax.

[1] John Henry Bell was born in Bradford, in the northern wool-manufacturing region of England, in 1832 to Scottish parents.

After his time in Leeds, Bell returned to Bradford to establish his medical practice, and became one of the founders of the Royal Eye and Ear Hospital, where he worked for 40 years.

A friend who had recently visited European bacteriological laboratories introduced him to the idea that the "woolsorters' disease" was caused by an infection from the animal, which Robert Koch had discovered in 1877 to be anthrax bacillus.

[2] Following this discovery, Bell recommended that deaths from woolsorters' disease could be reduced if fresh air were blown through the wool for 24 hours before it was sorted.