Samir Kumar Saha

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Samir Kumar Saha
Born (1955-12-28) December 28, 1955 (age 68)
NationalityBangladeshi
EducationUniversity of Dhaka (MS)
Institute of Medical Sciences, Banaras Hindu University (PhD)
AwardsAmerican Society for Microbiology (2017)
UNESCO Carlos J. Finlay Prize for Microbiology (2017)
Scientific career
FieldsMicrobiology
InstitutionsDhaka Shishu Hospital

Samir Kumar Saha (born 28 December 1955) is an eminent Bangladeshi microbiologist and public health expert.[1][2] He is the professor, senior consultant and head of the department of Diagnostic Division of Microbiology at the Dhaka Shishu Hospital for children and also the executive director of The Child Health Research Foundation (CHRF) at the Bangladesh Institute of Child Health.[2][3][4]

Education

Saha attended Chandpur Government College.[5] He earned his BSc. and MSc. from The University of Dhaka in 1983, and his PhD from the Institute of Medical Sciences of Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India, in 1989.[6]

Career

Saha is known for his research on

infectious diseases specializing in pneumonia, meningitis and enteric fever. He is focused on finding the true burden of these diseases, their causative organisms, drug resistance patterns and serotype distributions.[7][8][9]

In 2017, Saha was the first scientist from a developing country to receive the

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation at the International Vaccine Access Center, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, US.[12]

Personal life

Samir Kumar Saha is microbiologist Senjuti Saha's father. His wife Dr. Setarunnahar Setara is a public health researcher. His youngest son is also a microbiologist by profession.[13]

Achievements

Saha played a key role in implementing vaccines against two bacteria that cause meningitis and pneumonia in Bangladesh.[14] It had a direct positive impact on the health of children in the country.[3][15]

As a leading researcher in pediatrics, he has been performing surveillance on invasive childhood diseases in Bangladesh for more than a decade.[16][17] He has also led research into the resistance to treatment of some pneumococcal diseases.[1][3][18]

Saha along with his team designed and set up four sentinel hospital surveillance network in Bangladesh. The "community adjusted hospital-based surveillance" is a model of surveillance that records data of the burden of diseases at a population level.[19] The surveillance data is generated on invasive childhood diseases caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae,[8] Haemophilus influenzae,[20] Salmonella typhi/paratyphi,[9] etc.

Saha has published more than 150 papers in peer-reviewed journals, mostly exploring the topics of childhood pneumonia and meningitis.[16][17][21]

Public health organizations

A member of

International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B). He is also a member of the National Committee for Immunization Policies of the Government of Bangladesh.[6]

Honors and awards

Saha has been recognized by numerous awards including:

References

  1. ^ a b c d e "Bangladeshi microbiologist wins Unesco award". Dhaka Tribune. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  2. ^ a b c d "Bangladeshi Dr Samir wins UNESCO award for microbiology". risingbd.com. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  3. ^ a b c d "UNESCO award is recognition for my country". The Daily Star. October 22, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  4. ^ "Management Board (Present)". Dhaka Shishu Hospital. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  5. ^ চাঁদপুর সরকারি কলেজের ৭৫ বছর পূর্তি উৎসব আজ [Today is the 75th anniversary of Chandpur Government College]. Jugantor (in Bengali). February 24, 2023.
  6. ^ a b c "Samir K. Saha". chrfbd.org. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  7. PMID 23773597
    .
  8. ^
    PMID 22479314
    .
  9. ^
    PMID 29073137
    .
  10. ^ a b Urban, Joanna. "Announcing the 2017 ASM Award Winners". www.asm.org (Press release). Retrieved January 9, 2018.
  11. ^ "Shahida Hasnain (Pakistan) and Samir Saha (Bangladesh) to receive Carlos J. Finlay UNESCO Prize for Microbiology". UNESCO. October 17, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  12. ^ "The Life-Saving Vaccine the World Has Never Heard Of... - Stop Pneumonia". stoppneumonia.org. Retrieved January 9, 2018.
  13. ^ একজন সেঁজুতির বিজ্ঞানী হয়ে ওঠা. Sarabangla.net (in Bengali). May 24, 2020. Retrieved July 10, 2020.
  14. ^ a b "UNESCO awards Bangladeshi microbiologist". The Daily Star. October 22, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  15. ^ a b "Bangladeshi microbiologist awarded UNESCO Prize". banglanews24.com. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  16. ^ a b Jamal, Sana (October 20, 2017). "Pakistan professor wins prestigious UNESCO award". Gulf News. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  17. ^ a b "Pakistani laureate awarded UNESCO Prize for Microbiology - Pakistan". Dunya News. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  18. ^ "Pakistani Professor Wins UNESCO Prize for Microbiology". www.technologyreview.pk. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  19. ^ "Multiple Modalities to Explore Typhoid among Children: implication in vaccination policy" (PDF).
  20. PMID 15689914
    .
  21. ^ "Pakistani scientist awarded UNESCO prize for microbiology". Pakistan Today. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
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