France

Aids researchers win Nobel for Medicine

Article published on the 2008-10-06 Latest update 2008-10-06 14:41 TU

2008 Nobel Prize Medicine winners Barre-Sinoussi (l), Montagnier (c) and zur Hausen (r)
(Photo: AFP)

French scientists Françoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier won the 2008 Nobel Prize for Medicine for their discovery of the viruses behind Aids, it was announced Monday. Barre-Sinoussi told France Info radio she was surprised at winning the prestigious award, adding that she had dedicated her career to researching the virus.

Barre-Sinoussi and fellow workers at the Pasteur Institute in Paris published a landmark paper in the US journal Science in 1983 on their successful attempt at isolating a virus from a patient with Aids.

"We knew it was an important discovery but ... we didn't realize the impact of the epidemic on the African continent," she told the radio from Cambodia, where she is currently working for a French agency, researching HIV with tuberculosis.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy congratulated the award winners after the announcement was made, saying that their discovery had paved the way for treatments to be developed to "benefit millions of people across the world".

"There is not enough money in Aids research, and we need to bring in new blood, especially young researchers who also want to get involved and bring in new ideas, especially in the field of vaccines, which so far has been a failure," she added.

Germany's Harald zur Hausen was awarded half the prize in conjunction with his work on pinpointing the human papilloma virus as a cause of cervical cancer.