In the 1960s, there was an unprecedented malaria outbreak, and my country was not immune to tens of millions of infection cases. World Health Organization was helpless in this.
At the same time, in Southeast Asia, the United States and Vietnam are in full swing. Because Vietnam belongs to the subtropical monsoon climate of , it is damp, hot and rainy, and mosquitoes are raging. Both the United States and Vietnam are trapped in the struggle for malaria, which is even more tragic than the war between the two sides.
As a neighbor of Vietnam, our country has judged the situation and proposed to carry out malaria research and prevention and control technologies.
On May 23, 1967, the National Science and Technology Commission held a special meeting to form a professional scientific research team with the goal of developing a world problem - new antimalarial drugs. The date of the day is code--"523 Mission".
As a Beijing traditional Chinese medicine researcher Tu Youyou served as the leader of the first group of the project.
Many experts have different opinions on antimalarial drugs:
1. The United States and Western developed countries cannot solve this global problem. Can we rely on our people?
2. Now that malaria has developed to the present, it is extremely resistant to drugs. Our Western medicine started late, so how many years will it take to catch up?
3. Our traditional Chinese medicine has not been recognized by countries around the world. Should traditional Chinese medicine research continue?
These problems are sharper than the other, and they are also in line with the actual situation at that time. Many project teams were confused.
As the leader of the first group, Tu Youyou did not argue with these questioners, but led the scientific research team to quickly tackle the problem.
Tu Youyou studied traditional Chinese medicine, and he could only start with the medical classics of China and even tried some folk remedies. From thousands of prescriptions, screening to 640 were the key points.
In that era, the funds for scientific research projects were very tight, and in extraordinary times, I had to think of extraordinary solutions. Tu Youyou thought of the large water tank used for pickles at home as an experimental vessel, which shows how difficult the experimental conditions were at that time.
Due to the simplicity of the laboratory, Tu Youyou himself suffered from toxic hepatitis, and other team members also suffered various physical injuries.
When the 191st experiment was conducted, Artemisia annua showed 100% antimalarial drug effect.
However, this is an unknown whether Artemisia annua is safe for the human body.
In order to enter clinical trials as soon as possible, Tu Youyou made a major decision: to test the medicine with her own body.
In July 1972, Tu Youyou, Lang Linfu and Yue Fengxian petitioned the organization to try medicine with their bodies. Finally, the organization agreed to their application after careful consideration of the malaria outbreak environment at that time.
This is an attempt in an unknown field. They said that the situation was special at that time and did not consider personal safety at all. They only wanted to complete the tasks assigned by the motherland.
Through three-person clinical trials, it was proved that this extract is effective for various malaria. And this extract is what we are familiar with today's "artemisinin".
In October 1981, the World Health Organization held an international artemisinin special meeting in Beijing. Tu Youyou made the report on "Chemistry Research of Artemisinin" as the chief spokesperson, which was highly praised. The conference unanimously agreed that the emergence of artemisinin should point out the direction for the synthetic design of new drugs.
Tu Youyou's great achievements in artemisinin have been questioned by her peers and other experts.
Because Tu Youyou only deals with artemisinin throughout her life, she has no doctorate degree or study abroad background, and has published very few papers and works. Her colleagues also believe that artemisinin is a collective scientific research achievement and the honor does not belong to her at all.
For this reason, Tu Youyou applied for academicians four times, but none of them were successful.
At this time, Tu Youyou did not stand up to argue with these people, but instead focused on the medical career.
At this time, Tu Youyou's artemisinin achievements have been spotted by Louis Miller, an American anti-malaria peer expert. He believes that this is a great invention of CC3
and should win the Nobel Prize for .
Since 2010, Miller has recommended Tu Youyou to the Nobel Organizing Committee every year.
In 2011, Lask, the United States, which claims to have a Nobel Prize vane, awarded the Clinical Medicine Prize to Tu Youyou.
Domestic colleagues spoke out again, believing that artemisinin is a collective scientific research achievement. Since Tu Youyou won the Lask Clinical Medicine Prize, he could no longer win the Nobel Prize.
In 2015, the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine Organizing Committee conducted a comprehensive investigation into Tu Youyou's research on artemisinin.
The survey results are: Tu Youyou is the first to introduce artemisinin into the "523 Project"; the first to propose 100% activity; the first clinical trial. You only need to match one of them to win the award.
In December of the same year, Tu Youyou won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, becoming the first Chinese to win the Nobel Prize in Science and .
In 2015, Tu Youyou was 85 years old. She must have been under a certain huge pressure. In her speech on the award, she said:
"I also want to invite 85 scientists who have participated in the 523 project to Sweden to jointly publish a scientific research report on artemisinin, but I am afraid that the Nobel Prize Foundation will not be able to bear this huge expense. In the end, I decided to come alone, representing China, representing Chinese traditional Chinese medicine and Chinese scientists, and receive the Nobel Prize...
After returning to China, Tu Youyou told reporters, "Scientific research results are team achievements..."
Tu Youyou shared a bonus of 4 million Swedish kroner (about 2.65 million yuan). She herself deducted the travel expenses of her family's accompanying her to and from the Swedish award ceremony, and donated 2 million yuan of them to Peking University School of Medicine and Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine. The Tu Youyou Innovation Fund was established to reward young scientific researchers.
On June 30, 2021, the World Health Organization announced that China has passed the certification for eliminating malaria. This is another major infectious disease eliminated by my country after smallpox, polio , filariasis , and neonatal tetanus .
"Artemisinin is a gift from traditional Chinese medicine to the world" This is what Tu Youyou said to the world.
