Late researcher named 'role model of time'

Wang Yiping, a researcher at Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences, who passed away this year, was awarded the title of "role model of our time" on Friday for his dedication to pharmacological studies while struggling with disease.

The drug he developed, Danshen depside salts, has benefited more than 20 million patients who suffered coronary heart disease and angina across the country. During 25 years of research, he has completed evaluations of more than 50 new drug projects and helped set up a comprehensive cardiovascular drug development system.

This April, he was found dead in his office at the age of 55.

To Wang, "What would you do if today was the last day of your life" was never a question, but the cruel reality he might have faced every single day.

In 1993, then 30-year-old Wang was diagnosed with Crohn's, an inflammatory bowel disease that has no cure and can only be controlled by drugs. He had one meter of his small intestine removed and, as a doctor, knew perfectly well that his body would deteriorate day by day.

He still had one wish: to invent drugs that are the first choice for doctors around the world. Since then, he began his race against time.

A year later, he was appointed head of a research team to screen and test the efficacy of compounds of Danshen, or red sage, a plant highly valued in traditional Chinese medicine to reduce high cholesterol, high blood pressure and chest pain, but the active ingredients of which had remained unknown.

After countless experiments, Wang finally discovered the major medicinal component of the plant. Based on the component's activity, Wang and his team created Danshen depside salts, which hit the market in 2006 and began being applied clinically in more than 5,000 hospitals nationwide.

The drug was recognized by China's top food and drug authorities as "a paragon of adapting TCM to modern medicine".

The invention of the drug earned him many honors including the National Technology Invention Award and Distinguished Scientific Achievement Award, China's highest science and technology awards.

However, his pursuits went far beyond this. For over 20 years, he has also been devoted to a new drug against arrhythmia, a problem with heart rate, which has already completed phase II of clinical trials.

"Each effort I put into new drug development can bring a little hope to people's health. If there's a medicine that is the first choice of doctors around the world, that would be my ideal medicine. I hope I can make such a medicine in my life," he said.

His condition deteriorated over the years, dragging his weight down below 45 kilograms.

Despite the disease, Li Huihui, one of Wang's PhD students, said Wang seemed to never know tiredness. He always showed up at the office at 7 am and left work after 9 pm, and often worked overtime until midnight or on weekends.

He kept a record of his condition in a notebook, and his wife recalled him telling her one week before he died that he could work at least another 10 years.

The medicine he had been taking gradually lost its effectiveness and he decided to increase the dose.

"He just wanted to buy more time to finish the new drug he'd been working on and complete his studies on cardiovascular pharmacology," said Li Jun, the institute's deputy Party secretary. "He still had many things he wanted to accomplish."

Xinhua contributed to this story.