Professor Sir David Weatherall (1933 – 2018)

Green Templeton was saddened to hear of the passing of Professor Sir David Weatherall GBE FRC.

Sir David had an outstanding career in medical research, with particular interest in haematology and genetics, and the application of such research – particularly in the developing world.  Through well over 700 publications and his work as Senior Editor of the Oxford Textbook of Medicine, his influence extended far beyond the UK and his research has been applied to the development of disease prevention, control, and alleviation programmes across the world.

Through his work on the genetics of blood disorders, particularly thalassaemia, he demonstrated for the first time that a gene deletion could cause human disease.  His work in this area has made possible the detection of thalassaemia early in pregnancy, enabling antenatal diagnosis, and the eradication of the disease in some parts of the world.

Sir David was an Honorary Fellow of Green Templeton from its inception, and a member of the Advisory Council of Green College (as was).  He was a highly respected and very appreciated member of the Green Templeton community, and one of our key scholarships is in his name: the David Weatherall Scholarship.

He founded the Oxford Institute of Molecular Medicine in 1989, and won the prestigious Lasker Award for medical research in 2010.

He was knighted in 1987, and was made a Knight of the Grand Cross (the highest title in the Queen’s Birthday Honours) in 2017, in recognition of his services to medicine.

An obituary to Professor Sir David Weatherall on the University of Oxford website can be viewed here.

An obituary to Professor Sir David Weatherall on The Times can be viewed here.