What changed for you after the Nobel?
After the Nobel, several things changed for me. There came a sudden, not necessarily wanted, notoriety [laughs]. I couldn't go to a grocery store without people seeing me. I couldn't just be a person, you know. For a couple of months, my ability to work was affected because people would come up and see me. But it did all come back to normal, eventually.
The positive thing that really happened was the fact that immunotherapy, which was so controversial for so many years—for long, it was considered 'voodoo', 'quack medicine'—[got recognised]. I didn't really get into the big argument for a long time, because to me it made sense to focus on my work and see how it really came out. We know now that it works. We know that a lot of people with cancer are getting cured now, and so, having it finally accepted as a way of treating cancers, that is really a positive thing. Now, I can actually sit down and have discussions with people who were like ‘you have to identify the causes of cancer and block the mutations instead of saying that we make the immune system work’.
Besides the Nobel, the thing that really consolidated the whole result (of Allison's work on immunotherapy) was that the American Cancer Society released data saying that the mortality rate due to melanoma had fallen by 18 per cent, and this has largely been due to immunotherapy. It has made a difference in people's lives, and as a scientist, as someone who mostly wants to figure out how things work, being able to do something that helps people... that has been really great.
It has worked for other cancers beyond melanoma, too.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة May 02, 2021 من THE WEEK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة May 02, 2021 من THE WEEK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
What Will It Take To Clean Up Delhi Air?
IT IS ASKED, year after year, why Delhi’s air remains unbreathable despite several interventions to reduce pollution.
Trump and the crisis of liberalism
Although Donald Trump's election to a non-consecutive second term to the US presidency is not unprecedented—Grover Cleveland had done it in 1893—it is nevertheless a watershed moment.
Men eye the woman's purse
A couple of months ago, I chanced upon a young 20-something man at my gym walking out with a women’s sling bag.
When trees hold hands
A filmmaker explores the human-nature connect through the living root bridges
Ms Gee & Gen Z
The vibrant Anuja Chauhan and her daughter Nayantara on the generational gap in romance writing
Vikram Seth-a suitable man
Our golden boy of literature was the star attraction at the recent Shillong Literary Festival in mysterious Meghalaya.
Superman bites the dust
When my granddaughter Kim was about three, I often took her to play in a nearby park.
OLD MAN AND THE SEA
Meet G. Govinda Menon, the 102-year-old engineer who had a key role in surveying the Vizhinjam coast in the 1940s, assessing its potential for an international port
Managing volatility: smarter equity choices in uncertain markets
THE INDIAN STOCK MARKET has delivered a strong 11 per cent CAGR over the past decade, with positive returns for eight straight years.
Investing in actively managed low-volatility portfolios keeps risks at bay
AFTER A ROARING bull market over the past year, equity markets in the recent months have gone into a correction mode as FIIs go on a selling spree. Volatility has risen and investment returns are hurt.
