Win for

By Paul Pickering
FERNTREE Gully’s Dr Helen Cox has won Victoria’s top medical award for her research into Uzbekistan’s devastating tuberculosis epidemic.
Dr Cox, 39, was presented with the 2007 Premier’s Award for Medical Research at Government House last Monday, 4 June.
The award is bestowed on Victoria’s most outstanding postgraduate health or medical research scholar.
Dr Cox received the recognition for her work as a volunteer with medical-humanitarian aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in the Aral Sea region of Uzbekistan – where the rate of tuberculosis infection is the highest in the world.
The ecological disaster in the region is a result of a catastrophic decision to divert the Amu Darya River in order to irrigate cotton crops during the Soviet era.
The scheme effectively eliminated the Aral Sea’s primary water supply, reducing what was the world’s fourth largest inland sea to a quarter of its former size.
Salt and pesticides have now contaminated the region’s main source of fresh water, contributing to a range of health problems for local residents.
Dr Cox discovered that because the drugs being used to treat tuberculosis were at least 40 years old, the bacteria had developed a resistance to those drugs, rendering them ineffective in many cases.
As a result of her research, MSF has initiated a specialised treatment program for drug-resistant TB in Uzbekistan, and is calling for more effective treatment options worldwide.
At the award ceremony, Health Minister Bronwyn Pike said: “Dr Cox’s research findings provided a catalyst for renewed international efforts to fight this public health menace, which knows no borders but is treatable over time and with patience.”
While Dr Cox said she was humbled by the personal recognition, she was most pleased that the award had gone to someone working in the area of international health.
“Because TB is a disease of poverty, there’s no market for new drugs in comparison to diseases that affect the more wealthy countries,” she said.
“This recognition is great because it highlights the diseases in the developing world.”
Dr Cox, who studied at the University of Melbourne before taking up her current position as an epidemiologist at the prestigious Burnet Institute, first went to Uzbekistan in 2001.
She was there for more than two years and has returned sporadically since, with her last visit in October last year.
“It’s very interesting to live and work in those conditions,” she said.
“While there is always going to be problems, it’s mostly quite comfortable and the people are very warm and hospitable.”
Despite the obvious kick-start that the award and $16,000 prize will give her career, she is reluctant to look too far ahead.
Dr Cox says she would like to continue doing research into TB – “because it is such a neglected disease” – and is willing to go wherever that takes her.
Few would doubt that her services will be in high demand.