12/06/2004

Ohio State Virologist Joins Richard Gere, Tom Brokaw As Recipient of the 2005 AARP The Magazine Impact Awards

Writer:

Mauricio Espinoza
espinoza.15@osu.edu
(330) 202-3550

Source:

Steve Slack, OARDC Director
oardc@osu.edu
(330) 263-3701

Mo Saif, Food Animal Health Research Program
saif.1@osu.edu
(330) 263-3743

Gabrielle Redford, AARP The Magazine
gredford@aarp.org
(202) 434-6846

WOOSTER, Ohio -- What does Ohio State University virologist Linda Saif have in common with Hollywood luminary and AIDS activist Richard Gere and legendary newscaster Tom Brokaw? Much more than you think.

Saif will join Gere, Brokaw and seven other personalities Monday, Dec. 6 at the New York Public Library to accept the 2005 Impact Awards presented by AARP The Magazine -- the official publication of the American Association of Retired People and the country’s largest-circulation magazine -- to Americans “who improve the world we live in.”

A scientist with the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center’s (OARDC) Wooster campus, Saif was chosen by AARP The Magazine because of her contributions to the worldwide battle against severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), said Gabrielle Redford, the magazine’s senior editor. Saif is the only scientist receiving the annual recognition.

“For more than 25 years, Linda Saif quietly worked in one of medicine’s less fashionable areas -- the infectious diseases of farm animals,” contributing editor David Dudley wrote in AARP The Magazine’s online edition. “Then people in Hong Kong started dying from a mystery illness called SARS, and Dr. Saif’s singular expertise proved suddenly invaluable. SARS was triggered by a coronavirus, a type of bug that usually causes only cold symptoms in humans but can be deadly in animals. As one of the world’s leading authorities on animal coronaviruses, Dr. Saif and her Ohio State University animal-virus lab suddenly found themselves at ground zero in the battle for lives.”

A previously unknown disease, SARS fueled fears of a global pandemic between 2002-2003 by rapidly spreading from Asia to North America and killing more than 900 people.

“This recognition reflects everybody’s work in this institution,” said Mo Saif, chair of OARDC’s Food Animal Health Research Program (FAHRP), where his wife and colleague works. “The fact that she is the only academician in the group is very significant. It shows that academicians really do great things. Most recognitions scientists receive come from their peers, so the fact that this award is given by a non-scientific organization shows that society values our contributions.”

The other awardees are William Donaldson, Wall Street watchdog; Jane Seymour, actress and children’s advocate; Princess Yasmin Aga Khan, Alzheimer’s advocate; Antonia Hernández, California civil rights leader; Alice Coles, Virginia community leader; George Wein, jazz impresario; and Gloria White-Hammond, a missionary in Africa.

Profiles are available online at www.aarpmagazine.org. The awardees will also be featured in the January/February print issue of the magazine, which reaches 35 million AARP members.

“Linda’s contributions have an impact that spans from agricultural to human health issues,” OARDC Director Steve Slack said. “This award is testament to the fact that our society places high value on her scientific contributions.”

A member of the National Academy of Sciences and an Ohio State Distinguished University Professor, Linda Saif has been studying coronaviruses for nearly three decades. Her lab is recognized worldwide for the development of diagnostic tests and vaccines for pathogens such as the bovine coronavirus (BCV), the porcine transmissible gastroenteritis virus (TGEV) and TGEV’s respiratory variant, PRCV, all of which cause significant losses to the livestock industry.

Since SARS became an epidemic in late 2002, Linda Saif’s lab has been sending animal coronavirus reagents to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO). Early this year, her lab became a member of the WHO International SARS Reference and Verification Laboratory Network -- one of only two reference labs for animal coronaviruses in the world and one of three U.S. labs in the network.

Her lab has also received a $2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to use the swine coronavirus as a model to learn more about SARS. FAHRP has also landed a $1 million contract with NIH to produce animal coronavirus antisera and virus pools for distribution to WHO labs around the world.

“A lot of people said, years ago, that we were on the verge of conquering infectious disease,” Linda Saif told AARP The Magazine. “But now we can see that emerging diseases are coming at us at a fast and furious rate. Our only hope is doing more research.”

OARDC is the research arm of Ohio State’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences.

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