One Nobel laureate’s discovery would save the life of another who would later get a Nobel prize himself!
Sounds like a script of a Manmohan Desai!?
Well sometimes real life stories are so amazing!
The story starts with a Banter; I mean Banting!
Frederick Banting, was a Canadian surgeon interesting in Diabetes!
In 1920, Banting had a 25-word hypothesis about isolating a substance from the pancreas to treat diabetes, which he presented to Professor J.J.R. Macleod who then gave Banting a lab at the University of Toronto.
Sure enough Banting and his assistant, Charles Best, began experimenting with pancreatic extracts on dogs. Finally by the spring of 1922, they had purified a usable insulin extract with the help of James Collip.
The major impact was that this Insulin allowed people with diabetes to manage their blood sugar levels, transforming the disease from a death sentence into a manageable condition!
Banting and Macleod were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1923 for the discovery!
Now lets go to the next Noble Nobel!
George Richards Minot was born in a family of doctors!
His father was a physician, also his uncle and his great grandfather were the founder of a Hospital!
So you would think; wow now that’s a chair ready to sit! His road to being a physician was ready! He did become one but then came the bad news!
He was diagnosed with diabetes which at that time was a sure death sentence! If you want to know the horror stories of children with Diabetes you can just Google!
Even for adults it was a terminal illness! Not like now when it is just a condition! People with severe disease usually succumbed in a year!
Luckily Banting discovered insulin as you had already read above!
Minot was treated and went on to win his own Nobel! He treated another terminal illness at the time!
He with his team all discovered an effective treatment for pernicious anemia, with liver concentrate high in vitamin B12, later identified as the critical compound in the treatment!
Banting thus saved so many life and he was altruistic as well!
Banting, in a spirit of altruism, sold the patent for insulin to the University of Toronto for just $1 so it could be distributed wide!
Altruism and dedication also was the middle name of Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam! Huge respect for him!
Shubh ratri!
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