In 1945, Albert Lasker and Mary Woodard Lasker created the Lasker Awards. Every year since then the award has been given to the living person considered to have made the greatest contribution to medical science or who has demonstrated public service on behalf of medicine. They are administered by the Lasker Foundation. The Lasker is sometimes referred to as "America's Nobels". The Lasker Awards have gained a reputation for identifying future winners of the Nobel Prize. Eighty-six Lasker laureates have received the Nobel Prize, including 32 in the last two decades. Claire Pomeroy is the current president of the Lasker Foundation.
Award The award is given in four branches of medical science:
Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award Lasker–DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award Lasker–Bloomberg Public Service Award (Renamed in 2011 from Mary Woodard Lasker Public Service Award. Renamed in 2000 from Albert Lasker Public Service Award.) Lasker–Koshland Special Achievement Award in Medical Science (1994– renamed to that name in 2008) (optional) The awards carry an honorarium of $250,000 for each category. A collection of papers from the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation were donated to the National Library of Medicine by Mrs. Albert D. Lasker in April 1985. In addition to the main awards, there are historical awards that are no longer awarded.
Recent awards Recent winners include the following:
Historical awards Awards no longer made include Special Public Health Awards, Special Awards, Group Awards, and Lasker Awards made by the International Society for the Rehabilitation of the Disabled, the National Committee Against Mental Illness, and Planned Parenthood – World Population. Awards were also presented for medical journalism.
Special Public Health awards 1975 – Merck Sharp and Dohme Research Laboratories: Karl H. Beyer Jr., James M. Sprague, John E. Baer, Frederick C. Novello 1980 – National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute 1984 – Dorothy T. Krieger, Kevin McLaughlin Jr. 1987 – Centennial Salute to the National Institutes of Health
Special awards 1947 – Thomas Parran Jr. 1949 – Haven Emerson 1952 – Charles-Edward Amory Winslow 1956 – Alan Gregg 1959 – J. Lister Hill and John E. Fogarty
Group awards 1946 – National Institutes of Health; National Regional Research Laboratory of the US Department of Agriculture; Board for the Coordination of Malarial Studies; Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine of the US Department of Agriculture; Army Epidemiological Board 1947 – British Ministry of Health and Ministry of Food; United States Committee on Joint Causes of Death 1948 – Veterans Administration's Department of Medicine and Surgery 1949 – American Academy of Pediatrics; Life Insurance Medical Research Fund 1950 – International Health Division of The Rockefeller Foundation 1951 – Health Insurance Plan of Greater New York; Alcoholics Anonymous 1953 – Division of Research Grants of the National Institutes of Health; University Laboratory of Physical Chemistry Related to Medicine at Harvard University 1954 – Streptococcal Disease Laboratory, Armed Forces Epidemiological Board, Francis E. Warren Air Force Base: Charles H. Rammelkamp Jr., Director 1956 – Food and Drug Administration; Medical Care Program, Welfare and Retirement Fund of the United Mine Workers of America 1960 – Crippled Children's Program of the Children's Bureau; Chronic Disease Program of the California State Department of Public Health (Lester Breslow)
International Society for the Rehabilitation of the Disabled 1954 – Henry H. Kessler, Juan Farill, Viscount Nuffield 1957 – Howard A. Rusk, Fabian W. G. Langenskiold, World Veterans Federation 1960 – Mary E. Switzer, Gudmund Harlem, Paul W. Brand 1963 – Renato de Costa Bomfim, Kurt Jansson, Leonard W. Mayo 1966 – Poul Stochholm, Wiktor Dega, Eugene J. Taylor 1969 – Gustav Gringas, Mr and Mrs Raden Soeharso, Andre Trannoy, International Labour Organization 1972 – James F. Garrett, Kamala V. Nimbkar, Jean Regniers
National Committee Against Mental Illness 1944 – William C. Menninger 1945 – G. Brock Chisholm, John Rawlings Rees 1946 – W. Horsley Gantt, Jules H. Masserman, Walter Lerch, Douglass Rice Sharpe, Lawrence K. Frank 1947 – Catherine MacKenzie 1948 – C. Anderson Aldrich, Mike Gorman, Al Ostrow 1949 – Mildred C. Scoville, Albert Deutsch
Planned Parenthood – World Population 1945 – John McLeod, Felix J. Underwood 1946 – Robert Latou Dickinson, Irl Cephas Riggin 1947 – Alan F. Guttmacher, Abraham Stone 1948 – John Rock, Richard N. Pierson 1949 – George M. Cooper, Carl G. Hartman 1950 – Margaret Sanger, Bessie L. Moses 1951 – Guy Irving Burch, William Vogt 1952 – John William Roy Norton, Herbert Thoms, Eleanor Bellows Pillsbury 1953 – Harry Emerson Fosdick, Elise Ottesen-Jensen 1954 – Dhanvanthi Rama Rau, M. C. Chang, Howard C. Taylor 1955 – Warren O. Nelson, Robert Carter Cook 1958 – Harrison S. Brown 1959 – Julian Huxley 1960 – Gregory Pincus 1961 – John D. Rockefeller, III 1964 – Cass Canfield 1965 – C. Lee Buxton, Estelle T. Griswold
See also List of medicine awards
References
External links The Lasker Foundation – Official site Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation – Albert Lasker Awards Archives (1944–) – National Library of Medicine finding aid