The 2020 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to
Harvey Alter of the US National Institutes of Health,
Michael Houghton of the University of Alberta and
Charles Rice of Rockefeller University.
This award is given to them for their research on Hepatitis C. Their research led to the identification of the hepatitis C virus, and today very sensitive blood tests have been made to identify the virus. Thanks to these tests, hepatitis C cannot be transmitted from one person to another through the blood. And it is their research that has made it possible to treat hepatitis C. And thanks to them and others like them, the World Health Organization plans to eradicate hepatitis C from the world by 2030.
According to the World Health Organization, 71 million people worldwide have chronic hepatitis C. And that number will be much lower than the actual number of patients because not every disease is reported. The disease kills about 400,000 people a year. Chronic disease is a disease that stays in the body for a long time.
Hepatitis C causes serious liver problems ranging from minor to life-threatening.
Identifying the culprits of the disease, studying it and finding out the cause of its spread is very important to prevent the disease, prevent it and find a cure for it.
In the 1970s, Harvey Allard studied blood transfusion hepatitis cases. Hepatitis A and B tests were developed at this time. But there were still cases of hepatitis due to blood transfusions. On this basis, it was stated that there is something undetectable besides hepatitis A and B that is causing hepatitis. Allard transfused patients with this specific hepatitis (now called hepatitis C) into the blood plasma chimpanzee. Chimpanzees also showed signs of hepatitis. And further research has shown that the crime that causes this particular hepatitis is a virus.
Michael Houghton and his colleagues, while researching hepatitis-infected chimpanzees, identified the genetic material of the virus and discovered that it was an RNA virus. And it was called the hepatitis C virus.
And Richard Rice's research shows how the hepatitis C virus affects the liver. And in this work also Chapmanzi was used.
Need of Research
Now, apart from the Nobel Prize, there are two things worth mentioning here. First of all, the establishment of scientific research institutes in the country, research in universities and professors conducting research in universities and conducting research to students is very important. Scientists do not have horns on their heads, they are just like normal human beings. The societies in which they are given a platform become more developed over time. Research in these societies benefits them and the rest of the world.
Role of chimpanzee
And another important thing is to study living things from an evolutionary point of view. When research is done on the guilt of a particular disease and its medicine is discovered, not all work, various tests, is done directly on human beings. As mentioned above, chimpanzees played a key role in the development of hepatitis C. Because chimpanzees and human ancestors have been in common in the recent past, there are many similarities between their systems. It is not necessary for every virus to harm every living thing. Because the hepatitis C virus can infect both humans and chimpanzees, the fact that both humans and chimpanzees are infected with the hepatitis C virus means that due to evolutionary similarities, the same weaknesses that exist in the human immune system are present in chimpanzees are present.
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