Dr James Muecke, an Ophthalmologist, was just named the 2020 Australian of the year. I’ll tell more about his amazing achievements later, but being named Australian of the Year is not just a recognition of outstanding achievement. It is also an opportunity for the recipient to spend the following year highlighting their cause to the public.
As I hadn’t heard of James before, his award had me wondering;
How many of our past recipients have been doctors in the 60 years since the award’s inception?
Care to have a guess?
A: 5 B: 9 C: 15 D: 21
From memory I could only recall five individuals whose names had become so familiar to me through their incredible advancements to our field. But when I checked the list what I discovered amazed me. I always learn so much when I look back at the history of my profession and consider what has been achieved by those who came before. You’ll definitely know some of these names, but even if you don’t, rest assured they have influenced our world in many extraordinary ways.
In fact it was a medical doctor, Sir Macfarlane Burnet, who was the recipient of the very first Australian of the Year honour in 1960. He was also awarded the Nobel Prize for his work in predicting acquired immune tolerance. He was a Virologist who contributed to many advancements in immunology, and the modern methods for producing influenza vaccines are still based on his work. At a time when Coronavirus has us all frightened, it is reassuring to know that, thanks to the work of Australian Doctors and Scientists like Burnet, we will be able to overcome this epidemic.
In 1963 we find Sir John Eccles, a Neurophysiologist who also received the Australian of the Year and Nobel Prize that year for his work on the synapse. Our modern approaches to using implanted electronics to interface with the nervous system rests upon this basic research of the structure of the nervous system.
In 1976 is a name that will be familiar to most people. Sir Edward “Weary” Dunlop was a Military Surgeon who served during World War II in the Middle East, Greece, Tobruk and Java where he was captured by the Japanese in 1942. As a prisoner of war he showed immense courage, compassion and leadership, restoring hope and morale amongst Australian prisoners who were sent to work on the Burma-Thailand Railway. My grandfather was also a medical doctor who served in WWII, and was also a Japanese POW but my grandfather never talked about his experiences and passed away when I was young. My only insights into his experiences came from reading Weary Dunlop’s book. I don’t think it is possible for members of my generation to fathom how fortunate we are to live with the freedom and security we currently enjoy. And we owe much to the men and women that have gone before us, and those who continue to serve today.
In 1990 another famous name, Fred Hollows, graces the list. An Ophthalmologist and Humanitarian, he not only used his medical skills to make a difference to Australians in need, he changed the way that sight was restored in developing countries around the world. He established a Foundation with the goal of ending avoidable blindness by training local eye specialists and making it possible for communities to produce affordable intraocular lenses locally.
In 1996 Paediatrician Dr John Yu was announced Australian of the Year. He may be less known to many, but as a Sydney sider I know he was the CEO of the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children when it relocated from Camperdown to Westmead in 1995. This was the hospital where my grandfather practiced and made his own contribution to the profession. Now called The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, I spent much of my time training there. John went on to be a major force in the passing of a bill to protect children from abuse.
In 1997 the next recipient on my list started his working life as a Veterinary Scientist, and later switched to biomedical research. It was for his work on cellular immune response in virus infections that he was recognised for a Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1996, then the Australian of the Year in 1997. Professor Peter Doherty is included on this list because our medical knowledge and capability was advanced by his groundbreaking research. In a very neat twist, the Australian team who made this week’s breakthrough of copying the Coronavirus are based at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity.
The 2000 recipient was Sir Gustav Nossal. He is a Biologist who advanced the understanding of how our immune system generates antibodies to protect us from infectious diseases. His ideas and experiments greatly clarified how the immune system learns to distinguish our own body from foreign invaders, and how breakdown of this tolerance can lead to autoimmune diseases. He worked under our first recipient Sir Macfarlane Burnet at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, and eventually took over the role of Director when Mac retired. He is one of Australia’s foremost science advocates and remains very active in promoting global health.
An Australian medico I expected to find on the list in 2001 but didn’t was Professor Graeme Clark. An ENT (Ear Nose & Throat) Surgeon, he helped to develop and implant the Cochlear implant, a device that has revolutionised the treatment of deafness across the globe. In fact Prof Clark was awarded the Senior Australian of the Year in 2001 which is why I didn’t find him on the list! As part of my own research, I am privileged to be working at the moment with many of the electrical engineers who worked with Graeme to create the Cochlear implant, in particular John Parker, CEO of Saluda Medical. It simply isn’t possible for one person alone to make game-changing advancements in this day and age, and the future of medical advancements in the Med Tech space is all about collaboration. The amazing technology that underpins the Cochlear implant can be applied in so many ways inside our bodies, and the future for disorders affecting the nervous system has never looked brighter.
In 2003 Professor Fiona Stanley, an Epidemiologist and another doctor turned researcher, was named Australian of the Year for her important research into childhood and maternal health. Fiona’s studies of public health issues, particularly birth disorders such as Cerebral Palsy, have been crucial to our efforts to improve childhood health (my work on Cerebral Palsy treatment included). By promoting the collection of important data, she has played an instrumental role in helping shift the focus of medicine from treatment to prevention.
In 2005 another Fiona received recognition. Professor Fiona Wood, a Plastic Surgeon (my own field of specialisation) is credited with advancing the development of so-called “Spray-on Skin”. She became well known by Australians when she treated a large number of the Bali bombing victims who were sent to Royal Perth Hospital. Surgeon, Researcher and Entrepreneur, Fiona displays the commitment to developing better treatments by integrating technological advancements with modern medical practice that also drives me in my own work.
About now, you are probably recognising the names due to the important and high profile roles they played during our own lifetimes. Professor Ian Frazer was named Australian of the Year in 2006. He is a doctor who chose Medical Research as his calling, becoming an Immunologist and discovering the relationship between the HPV virus and cervical cancer. He then went on to create a vaccine to protect women from this cancer, which was also the first vaccine designed to prevent cancer.
In 2007 it is interesting that an Australian Nobel Prize Winner and medical doctor who discovered that peptic ulcer disease was caused by a bacterium known as H. Pylori and not “stress” as it was commonly believed at the time, is NOT on the list. I was surprised by this one. Dr Barry Marshall, my personal favourite Australian doctor researcher who I learned about in medical school, is famous for proving the causative link between the bacteria and gastric ulcers. Amazingly, he did this by drinking infected broth which had been cultured from an ailing patient thereby developing the disease himself. His boldness and bravery was evident, if somewhat unconventional, and he was awarded Western Australian of the Year, but Tim Flannery was awarded Australian of the Year. No doubt this was a sign that the science of climate change was gaining widespread acceptance, and perhaps three doctors in a row would have been a bit too repetitive for the awarding committee!
In 2010 Psychiatrist Professor Patrick McGorry was recognised for his work on youth mental health and early intervention services. He did not back down from the challenges presented in this medical arena and I think we owe him much for bringing mental health right into the public eye. The current level of attention that mental health receives from Government, within workplaces and in the wider community is arguably attributable to the work Patrick performed in such a high profile and influential position a decade ago.
Australian of the Year in 2017 was Biomedical Scientist Professor Alan Mackay-Sim who was recognised for his stem cell research, which contributed to successful treatment for spinal cord injuries. His work was used in the restoration of mobility for a Polish paraplegic man, the first verifiable case of someone recovering sensory and motor function after having been paralysed. Spinal cord treatments using the latest research and technological advancements are a fascination of mine and I believe we will see seismic shifts in this field in the coming years, benefitting greatly from the work of people like Alan.
In 2019, Veterinary Surgeon, Dr Craig Challen and Anaesthetist, Dr Richard “Harry” Harris were recognised as Australians of the Year when they captured our imaginations and showed enormous courage, skill and heroism in pulling off the Tham Luang Cave Rescue in Thailand. Both experienced Cave Divers, their bold and daring plan to safely rescue all of the trapped soccer team still perplexes many of my anaesthetic colleagues.
And that brings us to this year’s recipient Dr James Muecke. He is probably not well known yet, but that is set to change. An Ophthalmologist who spent 3 decades working to prevent and treat blindness in some of the world’s poorest countries, he has more recently turned his attention to advocating for measures to tackle obesity, which can cause type 2 diabetes. He wants to avert this preventable disease, one common effect of which is to cause blindness.
So did you guess it right? C was the answer.
Although you might argue that my criteria was a little loose, you can’t deny that these 15 luminaries (and my 2 additions, and many other dedicated individuals) deserve their recognition and have changed the world in so many ways. They prove to me that we stand on the shoulders of giants as we go about our quest for better medical treatments. And as Australian medicos we punch well above our weight in terms of making dramatic discoveries that affect the global medical field. The boldness and bravery that each of these recipients has demonstrated also emphasises to me that nothing worth doing was ever easy.
Who is your favourite Australian of the Year? Whoever they are, I hope their spirit of dedication, purpose and altruism guide you on your own path, wherever that may take you.