Japanese virologist Dr. Michiyaki Takahashi developed the first vaccine against chickenpox in 1974
On February 17, 2022, a doodle on the homepage of search giant Google depicts Japanese virologist Dr. Michiyaki Takahashi, the developer of the world's first vaccine against chickenpox, to commemorate his 94th birthday.
The doodle, illustrated by Tatsuro Kiuchi, a Tokyo artist, shows Dr. Takahashi looking at his microscope, and putting a bandaid on a child's arm.
"Thanks to their innovations, millions of chickenpox cases are prevented every year," Google said in a note issued with the doodle.
Dr. Takahashi was born on this day in 1928 in Osaka, Japan. His chickenpox vaccine, named 'Oka', was developed in 1974 and later approved by the World Health Organization. Life-saving vaccinations began to be used by 80 countries and were administered to millions of children.
After earning a medical degree from Osaka University, Dr. Takahashi joined the Microbial Disease Research Institute at the same university in 1959 to study poliovirus and measles.
In 1963, Dr. Takahashi accepted a research fellowship at Baylor College, United States. It was during his time at the institute that his son developed a severe case of chickenpox, which caused him to turn the focus of his research aimed at developing a vaccine against the viral disease.
Returning to Japan in 1965, virologists began culturing weakened, live strains of chickenpox. In 1974, they came up with the first vaccine against the varicella virus, which causes the disease. The drug was subjected to a thorough testing process involving immunosuppressed patients, which ultimately proved to be highly effective.
The Research Foundation for Microbial Diseases at Osaka University began making the vaccine in Japan in 1986. At the time, Dr. Takahashi was the only vaccine approved by the World Health Organization against the varicella virus.
In 1994, Dr. Takahashi was appointed director of the Microbial Disease Study Group at Osaka University. He remained in this position till his retirement.
Dr. Michiyaki Takahashi died of cardiac arrest in 2013.