Alta. researcher shares Nobel prize for hep C virus discovery
EDMONTON — A University of Alberta researcher has been awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in medicine — the first time Canadian medical science has been so recognized in nearly a century.
British-born scientist Michael Houghton of the university’s Li Ka Shing Institute of Virology is one of three recipients of the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology for the discovery of the hepatitis C virus.
“It’s a great honour,” Houghton said following the announcement Monday.
“I’m really happy that I got it while I was at the University of Alberta. They’ve been a wonderful host for me.”
Houghton said the success is the result of persistence in basic science and applying it to realworld problems.
“You need basic research, but you have to use the information that basic research is producing. I would like to see a lot more effort applying our current knowledge to disease.”
He said the world’s current struggles with COVID-19 show that viral diseases are going to be an ongoing challenge for humanity.
“These viruses are a permanent threat. We need diagnostics. We need antivirals and we need vaccines.”
Houghton shares the prize with Americans Harvey Alter and Charles Rice.
The Nobel Committee noted that the men’s work identified a major source of bloodborne hepatitis that couldn’t be explained by the previously discovered hepatitis A and B viruses. Their work, dating back to the 1970s and 1980s, has helped saved millions of lives, it said.
“Highly sensitive blood tests for the virus are now available and these have essentially eliminated post-transfusion hepatitis,” the committee said.
“Their discovery also allowed the rapid development of ant-viral drugs directed at hepatitis C,” it added. “For the first time in history, the disease can now be cured.”
It’s the first Nobel for a medical researcher at a Canadian institution since Frederick Banting won in 1923 for the discovery of insulin, said the virology institute’s director, Lorne Tyrrell.
“Canada is so very proud to have their second [medical] Nobel Prize winner,” he said. “We’ve waited a long time.”
The hepatitis C virus is a major source of liver disease. The WHO estimates there are more than 70 million cases of hepatitis C worldwide and 400,000 deaths from it each year. The disease is chronic and a major cause of liver cancer and cirrhosis requiring liver transplants.
The Nobel Committee couldn’t reach Houghton at first to tell him he’d won. It was Tyrrell who finally reached him in California, where he also works.
“I was awake at 4 [a.m.],” Tyrrell said. “I was so excited when I saw the announcement. I waited a few minutes because I thought the Nobel Committee might be talking to Michael.”
The Nobel Committee often recognizes basic science that has laid the foundations for practical applications in common use.
The prestigious Nobel award comes with a gold medal and prize money of 10 million Swedish kronor (about $1.5 million Cdn), courtesy of a bequest left 124 years ago by Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel.
Monday’s medicine award is the first of six prizes being announced through Oct. 12.