Sign Unveiling In Doylestown Celebrates World Hepatitis Day, Legacy Of Baruch Blumberg

DOYLESTOWN, PA — To celebrate the legacy of the late Nobel Laureate Baruch S. Blumberg, MD, DPhil, and to commemorate World Hepatitis Day, the Hepatitis B Foundation, Baruch S. Blumberg Institute and Pennsylvania Biotechnology Center (PABC) held a sign unveiling on Monday at the PABC in Doylestown.

Along with new lighted signs on its buildings and at both entrances, the organization unveiled a sign on its newest building that reads, “Timothy M. Block Research Campus,” to honor Dr. Block, board chair of the Hepatitis B Foundation and co-founder of the Foundation, the Blumberg Institute and the PABC.

(Blumberg Institute)

The new sign is officially unveiled.

More than 100 of the nonprofit organizations’ leadership, staff, local officials and other supporters, including family members of Dr. Blumberg, participated in the afternoon event.

A short video clip of the unveiling is here.

Dr. Blumberg was born on July 28, 1925, and on that date people annually around the globe commemorate World Hepatitis Day in his honor.

“The Hepatitis B Foundation commemorates World Hepatitis Day every year by raising awareness about viral hepatitis,” Foundation President Dr. Chari A. Cohen, DrPH, MPH, said.

“With almost 300 million individuals living with hepatitis B worldwide, it is extremely important to bring awareness to this preventable and treatable disease.”

Ju-Tao Guo, MD, acting president and chief scientific officer of the Blumberg Institute, said: “As a colleague of Dr. Blumberg at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in the 1990s, I fortunately had his guidance and encouragement. Honoring this great scientist through today’s event and by displaying his name in bold letters on our facility is a genuine pleasure.”

A brilliant scientist and global health pioneer, Dr. Blumberg was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology in 1976, along with D. Carleton Gajdusek. Dr. Blumberg and colleagues discovered the hepatitis B virus in 1967 and then developed a blood test for the virus. Two years later he co-invented the first hepatitis B vaccine, which is known today as the world’s first “anti-cancer vaccine.”