Why The Viral Link to Cancer Deserved The Nobel Prize

In today’s world advances in science and medicine happen almost daily. Few of those discoveries prove to be a revolution in current scientific thought. This is one of those breakthroughs. Recently, the Nobel Committee announced that it would award the Nobel Prize for Medicine/Physiology to German professor Harald zur Hausen, who discovered the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) was the cause of cervical cancer. According to the Committee, his discovery “went against current dogma,” when in the 70s and 80s he strove to prove that the papillomavirues were the cause of cervical cancers. “He thus laid the foundations for better prevention and treatment of this form of cancer, which has become the third most common form to affect women,” says Professor Matthias Kleiner, President of the German Research Foundation. “I am, of course, completely surprised and it is a great pleasure for me,” expressed zur Hausen in an interview with Adam Smith from nobelprize.org. He credits his dedication and personal conviction to his discovery, working in a direction thought to be completely wrong by many of his contemporaries. “I was an unwelcome and lonely voice,” notes zur Hausen. Read More...

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