U OF A RESEARCHER WINS NOBEL FOR HEP C VIRUS DISCOVERY
AUniversity of Alberta researcher who made headlines in 2013 for refusing to accept a prestigious award because it didn't acknowledge the contributions of two of his colleagues, said on Monday he would accept the Nobel Prize.
Michael Houghton has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for the discovery of the hepatitis C virus, the first scientist at a Canadian university to win the prize since the discovery of insulin in 1923.
“I think it would be really too presumptuous of me to turn down a Nobel,” said Houghton in an interview Monday. “Great medicine is often a group of people and I think, going forward, we need to somehow acknowledge that, incorporate that into our policies.”
The prize- giving world is steeped in tradition and tends to limit the number of people to whom awards are given, he said. In refusing the Canada Gairdner International Award seven years ago, Houghton said he was trying to persuade them to be more “inclusive” and “modern.”
“It's great to get prizes, but, you know, at the same time there's always a difficulty in who should get the prize, how many,” said Houghton. “The reality is most big inventions ... involve many people.”
Houghton, 69, a British citizen born in London, is the director of the University of Alberta's Li Ka Shing Applied Virology Institute. He received the prize along with Harvey J. Alter and Charles M. Rice, both Americans, who contributed to the research on hepatitis C.
Houghton, who was in California Monday morning — he splits his time between Alberta and California — was woken shortly after 3 a.m. by a colleague letting him know he'd won the prize.
In 2013, when Houghton was nominated for the Gairdner, Alter and Dan Bradley, a researcher at the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, were also named. But two of Houghton's key collaborators were not and have also not been named by the Nobel Prize committee, despite their important work on the hepatitis C research: George Kuo, who ran his own lab, and Qui-Lim Choo.
Both worked with Houghton at Chiron Corporation, a U. S. biotechnology firm that was purchased in 2006 by Novartis International, a Swiss pharmaceutical firm. Houghton said Monday that without their help he would not have succeeded.
“I just feel that this is yet another example — and this is not the first time — of where a major discovery is done by a number of people, but when it comes to recognizing that discovery, they're exclusive rather than inclusive,” he told the National Post back in 2013, when he declined the Gairdner.
Before that, in a 2009 article explaining how the researchers found the hepatitis C virus, Houghton wrote: “As is evident in the text, I acknowledge the key roles played by George Kuo, Qui-Lim Choo and Dan Bradley in the discovery of the HCV genome. Many other colleagues made important contributions.”
The Nobel Prize was awarded for work done in the 1980s; Houghton and his colleagues identified the virus in 1989. A hep C vaccine is set for clinical trials next year.
The work takes on special significance in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“These viruses are really a
THE REALITY IS MOST BIG INVENTIONS ... INVOLVE MANY PEOPLE.
permanent threat,” Houghton said. “We need antivirals and we need vaccines.”
Houghton has also been working on COVID-19 vaccines.
“Really, COVID has taught us that we have to be better prepared in the future,” Houghton said.
The Nobel committee said their work saved millions of lives by explaining a source of blood- borne hepatitis that was unexplained by the hepatitis A and B viruses. Houghton told reporters that hepatitis C kills around 400,000 people annually.
“Their discovery also allowed the rapid development of antiviral drugs directed at hepatitis C,” the committee said.
“For the first time in history, the disease can now be cured, raising hopes of eradicating hepatitis C virus from the world population.”