Samir Kumar Saha

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]

Samir Kumar Saha
Born (1955-12-28) December 28, 1955
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

Career

Saha is known for his research on pediatric 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.[5][6][7]

In 2017, Saha was the first scientist from a developing country to receive the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) award for his outstanding research in Clinical Microbiology. Following which he has been elected to Fellowship in the American Academy of Microbiology.[8] The same year Saha received the UNESCO Carlos J. Finlay Prize in Microbiology, along with Shahida Hasnain, also a renowned Pakistani microbiologist for research and work in the field of microbiology.[1][2][3][9] The November 2017 edition of National Geographic Magazine published "Here’s Why Vaccines Are So Crucial", an article revolving around the need and impact of vaccines in society and vividly highlighted the lifelong dedication of Saha's fight to beating pneumonia and other pneumococcal infections in Bangladesh. After the publication of the article Saha was invited to attend a panel discussion on the various aspects of pneumococcal vaccines and vaccines in general, hosted and broadcast by National Geographic, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation at the International Vaccine Access Center, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, USA.[10]

Personal life

Samir Kumar Saha is microbiologist Senjuti Saha's father. His wife Dr. Setarunnahar is a public health researcher. His youngest son is also a microbiologist by profession.[11]

Education

Saha earned his BSc. and MSc. from The University of Dhaka in Bangladesh in 1983, and his PhD from the Institute of Medical Sciences of Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India, in 1989.[12]

Achievements

Saha played a key role in implementing vaccines against two bacteria that cause meningitis and pneumonia in Bangladesh.[13] It had a direct positive impact on the health of children in the country.[3][14]

As a leading researcher in pediatrics, he has been performing surveillance on invasive childhood diseases in Bangladesh for more than a decade.[15][16] He has also led research into the resistance to treatment of some pneumococcal diseases.[1][3][17]

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.[18] The surveillance data is generated on invasive childhood diseases caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae,[6] Haemophilus influenzae,[19] Salmonella typhi/paratyphi,[7] etc.

Saha has published more than 150 papers in peer-reviewed journals, mostly exploring the topics of childhood pneumonia and meningitis.[15][16][20]

International and national public health organizations

A member of Pneumococcal Awareness Council of Experts (PACE), he also heads the steering committee of the Coalition Against Typhoid (CaT) of the Sabin Vaccine Institute.[13][14][12] He is an associate of the Department of International Health of Johns Hopkins University, Maryland and adjunct scientist 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.[12]

Honors and awards

Saha has been recognized by numerous awards including:

References
  1. "Bangladeshi microbiologist wins Unesco award". Dhaka Tribune. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  2. "Bangladeshi Dr Samir wins UNESCO award for microbiology". risingbd.com. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  3. "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. Sultana, Nadira K.; Saha, Samir K.; Al-Emran, Hassan M.; Modak, Joyanta K.; Sharker, M. A. Yushuf; El-Arifeen, Shams; Cohen, Adam L.; Baqui, Abdullah H.; Luby, Stephen P. (July 2013). "Impact of introduction of the Haemophilus influenzae type b conjugate vaccine into childhood immunization on meningitis in Bangladeshi infants". The Journal of Pediatrics. 163 (1 Suppl): S73–78. doi:10.1016/j.jpeds.2013.03.033. PMC 4629472. PMID 23773597.
  6. Saha, Samir K.; Emran, Hassan M. Al; Hossain, Belal; Darmstadt, Gary L.; Saha, Senjuti; Islam, Maksuda; Chowdhury, Atique I.; Foster, Dona; Naheed, Aliya (March 30, 2012). "Streptococcus pneumoniae Serotype-2 Childhood Meningitis in Bangladesh: A Newly Recognized Pneumococcal Infection Threat". PLOS ONE. 7 (3): e32134. Bibcode:2012PLoSO...732134S. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0032134. ISSN 1932-6203. PMC 3316528. PMID 22479314.
  7. Saha, Senjuti; Islam, Maksuda; Uddin, Mohammad J.; Saha, Shampa; Das, Rajib C.; Baqui, Abdullah H.; Santosham, Mathuram; Black, Robert E.; Luby, Stephen P. (October 26, 2017). "Integration of enteric fever surveillance into the WHO-coordinated Invasive Bacterial-Vaccine Preventable Diseases (IB-VPD) platform: A low cost approach to track an increasingly important disease". PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. 11 (10): e0005999. doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0005999. ISSN 1935-2735. PMC 5658195. PMID 29073137.
  8. Urban, Joanna. "Announcing the 2017 ASM Award Winners". www.asm.org (Press release). Retrieved January 9, 2018.
  9. "Shahida Hasnain (Pakistan) and Samir Saha (Bangladesh) to receive Carlos J. Finlay UNESCO Prize for Microbiology". UNESCO. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  10. "The Life-Saving Vaccine the World Has Never Heard Of... - Stop Pneumonia". stoppneumonia.org. Retrieved January 9, 2018.
  11. একজন সেঁজুতির বিজ্ঞানী হয়ে ওঠা. Sarabangla.net (in Bengali). May 24, 2020. Retrieved July 10, 2020.
  12. "Samir K. Saha". chrfbd.org. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  13. "UNESCO awards Bangladeshi microbiologist". The Daily Star. October 22, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  14. "Bangladeshi microbiologist awarded UNESCO Prize". banglanews24.com. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  15. Jamal, Sana (October 20, 2017). "Pakistan professor wins prestigious UNESCO award". Gulf News. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  16. "Pakistani laureate awarded UNESCO Prize for Microbiology - Pakistan". Dunya News. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  17. "Pakistani Professor Wins UNESCO Prize for Microbiology". www.technologyreview.pk. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  18. "Multiple Modalities to Explore Typhoid among Children: implication in vaccination policy" (PDF).
  19. Saha, Samir K.; Baqui, Abdullah H.; Darmstadt, Gary L; RuhulAmin, M.; Hanif, Mohammed; Arifeen, Shams El; Oishi, Kazunori; Santosham, Mathuram; Nagatake, Tsuyoshi (February 1, 2005). "Invasive Haemophilus influenzae type b diseases in Bangladesh, with increased resistance to antibiotics". The Journal of Pediatrics. 146 (2): 227–233. doi:10.1016/j.jpeds.2004.09.007. ISSN 0022-3476. PMID 15689914.
  20. "Pakistani scientist awarded UNESCO prize for microbiology". Pakistan Today. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
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