Ho, Varmus Address Serious Issues at Commencements

Commencement ceremonies this spring at many colleges and universities across the country honored not only graduating students, but scientists hailing from a variety of fields. In recognition of their achievements, dozens of scientists received honorary degrees; some also offered words of advice to graduates. The speeches included the usual all-important cliches: Strive to be your best. Take risks. Seize opportunities. Retain your individuality. Learn for the sake of learning. However, several scientists also used the opportunity to voice their concerns on the current state of pressing issues such as AIDS research and public health. David Ho Speakers included well-known AIDS researcher David D. Ho, the director and chief executive officer of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center at Rockefeller University in New York. Ho spoke at the commencement ceremonies of both Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston and Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pa. Named Time Magazine's man of the year in 1996, Ho was the first to overturn the conventional assumption that the HIV virus remains dormant for up to ten years before causing AIDS--a discovery that led to his novel treatment of the virus with a combination of drugs. In speaking on the importance of the process of discovery, Ho shared with graduates the story of his own groundbreaking research: "Using data from our patients and working together with mathematicians, we proved that HIV replication in vivo was rapid and remorseless," Ho told his MIT audience. "In the course of only a few weeks, the old paradigm that HIV was largely a latent virus was completely shattered." Ho then went on to comment on the state of AIDS research. Ho later told The Scientist, "I have to use these opportunities to tell people about the severity of this epidemic and what needs to be done. [I try to], at the same time, provide some hope in that, despite the daunting problem, we have made advances that in turn have made a difference to people." Although he emphasized that scientists have a responsibility to serve as spokespersons, Ho also acknowledged the occasional downside of that role. Referring to the media onslaught that came as a result of his own investigations into HIV treatment, he told MIT graduates that he found the media spotlight "hot enough to bake." Asked if he would caution future scientists to be wary of media attention, Ho told The Scientist that he would "caution them to be cautious." He suggested that scientists are often "trying to do research while other people are looking over our shoulders," and that such scrutiny is "sometimes quite inhibitory to what we have to do." In both speeches, Ho also expressed his concern with what he termed "society's lack of commitment to research in basic science." He maintained that scientific investigations need not necessarily be goal-directed. "Sometimes we're just trying to explore nature and there may seem to be relatively few applications," Ho told The Scientist . "But it is exactly this sort of uninhibited exploration of basic science that has produced things that move our society forward." Steven ChuEnoch GordisDucan Moore Vero TylerHarold VarmusKevin Vigilante Harold E. Varmus, director of the National Institutes of Health since 1993 and 1989 co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine. addressed the graduates of Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health. He emphasized that the "application of health principles to populations is not a simple process." "It now seems essentially more complex than that part of medicine that serves individuals," continued Varmus. "It demands policy, community involvement, and often political action in addition to the laboratory and clinical research required to establish the principles one's trying to apply." To illustrate the difficulties that develop at the intersection of politics and science, Varmus commented briefly on President Bill Clinton's challenge of a year ago: that scientists should attempt to develop an AIDS vaccine in the next ten years. Although he applauds the president's efforts, Varmus recognized a "darker side to this scientific challenge." He cautioned against the public perception that scientists can "follow some simple timetable with recognizable milestones and reach this goal," and he warned that the pressure placed on scientists could "strengthen advocacy for what to me is essentially a misguided idea: that we must begin to use inherently limited resources, resources of trial subjects, funds, and political good will, to test vaccine candidates that show, at this point, no credible evidence of efficacy." Varmus told The Scientist that the political focus makes things especially difficult for those who would take leadership. He suggested that the spotlight "has made people a little wary of whether they're walking into a political firestorm. On the other hand, having a political focus on this has helped us raise money ... and it's galvanized excitement. A lot of people are attaching themselves to the program." Varmus also discussed needle-exchange programs as another example of health concerns that can become "constrained by political issues." According to Varmus, although he and his colleagues are convinced that such programs would reduce the transmission of viral infections, the logical next step has not been taken because of "concerns about a complex message that would be misinterpreted by the public." Said Varmus, "It is now more important than ever that the scientist's message be heard at the state and local levels and in other parts of the world." Commencement speeches, maintained Varmus, are an important part of disseminating that message to young persons. "An awful lot of undergraduates never really see a scientist," he told The Scientist . "They go to college and the curriculum is often not that prescriptive and people take liberal arts classes, and don't really come to recognize ... the major role scientists are playing in modern life." Varmus remembers the negative reaction of the Harvard class of 1996 when they found out that he would be their commencement speaker. He began his speech at Harvard, where there had not been a scientist speaker since Alexander Fleming in 1945, saying, "Agreed, I am not running for president, and I am not a prime minister or a general. But I speak for an element of our culture at least as important as politics or war. ... That element is science." "It's not that common to ask scientists to speak," Varmus concluded in an interview with The Scientist . "We really need to get out there." Bates College Walter E. Massey, president of Morehouse College in Atlanta; former director of the National Science Foundation; former president and chairman of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Brown University School of Medicine Henry Mankin, chairman emeritus of the department of orthopedics at Harvard Medical School Case Western Reserve University Siegfried S. Hecker, senior fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory, director of Los Alamos National Laboratory, 1986-97 Clarkson University Freeman Dyson, professor emeritus, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, N.J. Rudolf Zahradnik, president, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic and professor of physical chemistry at Charles University in Prague Columbia University Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academy of Sciences College of William and Mary Benjamin S. Carson, director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University Medical School Dartmouth University Samuel Katz, Wilburt C. Davison Professor Emeritus at Duke University Medical Center Mary-Claire King, professor of medicine and genetics at the University of Washington Drexel University John C. Browne, director of Los Alamos National Laboratory Johns Hopkins University Sam Shapiro, professor emeritus of health policy and management at the School of Public Health Harold E. Varmus, director of the National Institutes of Health since 1993; co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in physiology medicine in 1989 Louisiana State University James R. Andrews, specialist in orthopedic surgery, arthroscopy, and sports medicine Massachusetts Institute of Technology David D. Ho, scientific director and chief executive officer of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center in New York Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine Enoch Gordis, director of National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) Ting-Kai Li, distinguished professor of medicine and biochemistry at the Indiana University School of Medicine Northwestern University Leo Esaki, president of the University of Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan Moses Judah Folkman, senior associate in surgery and director of the Surgical Research Laboratory, Children's Hospital, Boston Robert F. Furchgott, Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the State University of New York, Medical Center Harold S. Johnston, professor emeritus of chemistry at the University of California at Berkeley Ohio State University Mildred S. Dresslhaus, professor of physics, electrical engineering, and computer science at MIT Penn State University Medical College Michael E. DeBakey, surgeon, heart transplant pioneer. The Medical Follow-up Agency was begun shortly after World War II at the urging of Dr. Michael DeBakey. Polytechnic Institute of New York Arthur Bienenstock, Associate Director for Science of the U.S. Office of Science and Technology Policy Rockefeller University Bruce Merrifield, John D. Rockefeller Jr. Professor Emeritus and head of the laboratory of biochemistry at Rockefeller University Swarthmore College David D. Ho, director and chief executive officer of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center at Rockefeller University in New York Thomas Jefferson University Shigeaki Hinohara, chairman of the Board of St. Luke's International Hospital in Tokyo, Japan University of Connecticut Varro E. Tyler, emeritus professor of pharmacognosy at Purdue University University of Indiana Odele Eisenstein, director of the Laboratory of Theoretical Chemistry University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Mary Lowe Good, managing member of Venture Capital Investors, LLC; science advisor to four U.S. presidents; under secretary of technology in U.S. Department of Commerce, 1993-97 University of Michigan, Dearborn Mae Jemison, professor of environmental studies and director of the Jemison Institute for Advancing Technology in Developing Countries at Dartmouth College; first black woman in space University of New Hampshire Marcia Neugebauer, distinguished visiting scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology University of North Carolina Susan P. Baker, professor of health policy and management and environmental health sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health; first director of the Johns Hopkins Injury Prevention Center University of Pennsylvania Francis S. Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute Stanley B. Prusiner, professor of neurology and biochemistry and biophysics at the University of California, San Francisco; recipient of the 1997 Nobel Prize in medicine University of Pittsburgh Steven C. Beering, president of Purdue University University of Rochester Steven Chu, Theodore and Frances Geballe Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Stanford University; 1997 recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics Duncan Moore, Rudolf and Hilda Kingslake Professor of Optical Engineering at University of Rochester; president of the Optical Society of America.

Ho, Varmus Address Serious Issues at Commencements

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