Rotavirus inventors to receive CHOP gold medal

As this front-page story in today's Philadelphia Inquirer reports, the three researchers responsible for the discovery of what ultimately became Merck's new rotavirus vaccine, RotaTeq, will receive the "Gold Medal" from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. As even the brief outline in the Inquirer story suggests, the story of RotaTeq could be a case study for the difficulties of developing new vaccines -- the work leading to this year's FDA licensure and ACIP recommendation extends all the way back to research conducted in 1980.

Congratulations to Paul Offit, Stanley Plotkin, and Fred Clark on this latest honor. (For the record, Offit and Plotkin are friends and colleagues who have contributed their insights and expertise in various ways to the development of the Ethics of Vaccines Project.)