Three scientists won the 2020 Nobel Prize for Medicine for their discovery of the Hepatitis C virus. Americans Harvey J. Alter and Charles M. Rice and British-born Michael Houghton will share the 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.1 million) award. 

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded by the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute, Stockholm in Sweden.

Announcing the prize in Stockholm, the Nobel Committee noted that the three scientists have made a decisive contribution to the fight against blood-borne hepatitis, a major global health problem that causes cirrhosis and liver cancer in people around the world.

Prior to their work, the discovery of the Hepatitis A and B viruses had been critical steps forward, but the majority of blood-borne hepatitis cases remained unexplained. The discovery of Hepatitis C virus revealed the cause of the remaining cases of chronic hepatitis and made possible blood tests and new medicines that have saved millions of lives.

The World Health Organisation estimates that Hepatitis C afflicts more than 70 million people and causes about 400,000 deaths each year. The disease is chronic and a major cause of liver cancer and cirrhosis requiring liver transplants.

The three winners

Harvey J. Alter joined the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as a clinical associate in 1961. He spent several years at Georgetown University before returning to NIH in 1969 to join the Clinical Center’s Department of Transfusion Medicine as a senior investigator.

Michael Houghton joined G.D. Searle & Company before moving to Chiron Corporation, Emeryville, California in 1982. He relocated to University of Alberta in 2010 and is currently a Canada Excellence Research Chair in Virology and the Li Ka Shing Professor of Virology at the University of Alberta where he is also director of the Li Ka Shing Applied Virology Institute.

Charles M. Rice established his research group at Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis in 1986. Since 2001 he has been Professor at the Rockefeller University, New York. During 2001-2018 he was the scientific and executive director, Center for the Study of Hepatitis C at Rockefeller University where he remains active.

How the trio discovered Hepatitis C?

The shared prize recognizes research dating back to the 1960s when Alter, who was working at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), found liver disease could be spread by blood transfusions that weren’t caused by Hepatitis A or B.

It was a team led by Houghton, then working for pharmaceutical firm Chiron, who was able in the mid-1980s to create a clone of a new virus from fragments found in the blood of an infected chimpanzee. This virus, belonging to the Flavivirus family, was named Hepatitis C. Its identification made it possible to develop tests to screen blood bank supplies and greatly reduce the spread of the disease, which can cause cirrhosis and liver cancer.

The final piece of the jigsaw puzzle came when Rice, then at Washington University in St Louis, was able using genetic engineering to generate a version of the Hepatitis C virus and demonstrate that it alone could cause symptoms in a chimpanzee comparable to an infection in humans. 

Significance of the discovery

The discovery of Hepatitis C virus is a landmark achievement in the ongoing battle against viral diseases. Highly sensitive blood tests for the virus are now available and these have essentially eliminated post-transfusion hepatitis in many parts of the world, greatly improving global health. 

Their discovery also allowed the rapid development of antiviral drugs directed at Hepatitis C. For the first time in history, the disease can now be cured, raising hopes of eradicating Hepatitis C virus from the world population. To achieve this goal, international efforts facilitating blood testing and making antiviral drugs available across the globe will be required. 

Nobel Prize

Alfred Nobel, an inventor, entrepreneur, scientist and businessman, lay the foundation for the prize in 1895 when he wrote his last will, leaving much of his wealth to the establishment of the prize. Since 1901, the Nobel Prize has been honoring men and women from around the world for outstanding achievements in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and for work in peace.

Manorama Yearbook app is now available on Google Play Store and iOS App Store