In Memoriam: Robert Austrian, M.D.

We're back after a longer-than-expected hiatus. We'll be catching up on news we missed while away but wanted to begin by noting the passing of a giant in vaccinology, a friend, and a founding contributor to our work on the ethics of vaccines -- Dr. Robert Austrian. The Philadelphia Inquirer began his obituary in this way:

"Robert Austrian, 90, a maverick researcher who ignored the hubris of the medical community after the discovery of penicillin and developed a vaccine for a bacterium that kills many pneumonia victims, died of a stroke last Sunday [March 25] at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania."

Obituaries also appeared last month in the New York Times and Baltimore Sun. The Times noted "the hundreds of thousands of lives" saved by the pneumococcal vaccine he developed.

Dr. Austrian was a kind, thoughtful man, a regular presence on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania two decades after his official retirement. He will be missed.