Samual L. Katz, MD's contributions to pediatric medicine are legendary. His landmark research in the 1960s led to the release of the measles vaccine, which has saved millions of lives worldwide. He also has made significant contributions to key studies of vaccines against polio, rubella, influenza, pertussis, and Haemophilus influenzae type b.

 

He has worked with World Health Organization (WHO) and government and non-profit organizations to provide measles vaccines across the world.

 

“In the 1960s the World Health Organization estimated that several million people died a year from measles. In 2006 it was down to about 250,000. That's still far too many, but I have a good feeling about the vaccine when I visit resource-poor countries,” Katz says.

 

He came to Duke in 1968 as chairman of the Department of Pediatrics. Over the next 22 years he built it into one of the nation's best departments not associated with a free-standing children's hospital. He credits the nucleus of talented people onboard when he arrived, and successful recruiting from places like Harvard. “What really attracted me to Duke was that you just walk out the door and can develop collaborations with people in engineering, psychology, law, history, and divinity. I took advantage of all of the good assets of Duke.”

 

Katz currently serves on the Board of Scientific Counselors at the Coordinating Center of Infectious Diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as well as chairing the Polio Research Committee of both the CDC and WHO.

 

Katz's many awards include the 2006 Alfred I. duPont Award for Excellence in Children's Health Care; the 2007 Pollin Prize for Pediatric Research from Columbia University ; the Howland Award of the American Pediatric Society; honorary doctorate degrees from Dartmouth College and Georgetown University; and the first Joseph St. Geme Jr. Award of the seven American Pediatric Societies.

 

Education: Dartmouth, Harvard

 

Training: Beth Israel Hospital, Boston; Children's Hospital Medical Center, Boston; Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston

 

Current Title : Wilburt C. Davison Professor and Chair Emeritus of Pediatrics at Duke

 

Personal: Married to Catherine Wilfert-Katz—the scientific director of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation and Duke professor emerita of pediatrics and virology—and lives in Chapel Hill. He has three daughters and four sons from his first marriage, including David Katz, T'78, MD'83 , and John Katz, L'78, as well as a step-daughter Rachel A. Wilfert, MD'01, HS'01-'02.