Researcher Oriol Mitjà Named One of Three Finalists for Catalan of the Year Award 2016

Oriol Mitjà, a researcher at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), has been chosen as one of the three finalists for the Catalan of the Year Award 2016. In the first round of the competition, Dr Mitjà, the illustrator Francisco Ibáñez and Manel Pousa (founder of the Pare Manel Foundation) were selected by popular vote from a field of ten candidates. The Catalan of the Year Award, which has been organised annually by the newspaper El Periódico de Catalunya since 2000, will now enter its final round. The winner will be announced on the evening of 16 May—the day public voting ends—at the gala award ceremony.

Originally from the Catalan town of Arenys de Munt, Dr Oriol Mitjà is a researcher at ISGlobal and an expert in tropical diseases. In 2012, he demonstrated that there was an effective, safe and inexpensive treatment for yaws. A person with the disease can be cured with a single pill of the oral antibiotic azithromycin. Yaws is a skin condition that mainly affects children and causes stigmatisation, disability, school absences and social exclusion.

The results of studies led by Dr Mitjà at ISGlobal have led the World Health Organisation (WHO) to establish the target of eradicating yaws by 2020. If this goal is achieved, yaws will be only the second disease—after smallpox—to be eradicated worldwide.

If Dr Mitjà is named Catalan of the Year, the award will not only recognise his dedication and hard work and that of his team but also raise awareness about the fight against yaws and the shared dream of wiping this disease off the map together.

Voting

Deadline to vote for the Català de l'Any award ends on 16 May.

You can vote for your candidate on the following link: cataladelany.elperiodico.cat/