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100 years ago today – a medical milestone – or was it…?

100 years ago today saw Canadian scientist Fred Banting hoping to secure his place in medical history with the first ever injection of insulin into a human patient. But the result was disappointing. When he published the work, Banting said that ‘no clinical benefit was evidenced’. Yet only a year later, Banting had received the most prestigious accolade in science – the Nobel Prize – for this medical milestone. How come? What had changed? In a recent interview on BBC 5Live Naked Scientists podcast I explained why…

‘Insulin – the Crooked Timber’ – now available to pre-order!

I’m delighted that my new book ‘Insulin – the Crooked Timber’ will be published by Oxford University Press on 13th Jan 2022 to mark the centenary of a medical landmark that has saved countless lives – my own included! It’s a discovery for which I am very grateful and one which, in places, resembles Game of Thrones – enacted with lab coats and test tubes instead of chain mail and poisoned daggers! And it’s now available to pre-order at:

https://uk.bookshop.org/books/insulin-the-crooked-timber-a-history-from-thick-brown-muck-to-wall-street-gold/9780192855381

https://www.waterstones.com/book/insulin-the-crooked-timber/kersten-t-hall/9780192855381

https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Insulin-by-Kersten-T-Hall/9780192855381

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/insulin—the-crooked-timber-9780192855381?q=insulin%20the%20crooked%20timber&lang=en&cc=gb