Phil Provost

Life
1935 – 2018 (82 years old)

Country
United States

Year of great discovery/work
1979

Beginning in 1970, Provost worked under Maurice Hilleman at Merck. His efforts focused on hepatitis A. By figuring out how to grow large quantities of hepatitis A in cell culture, he was able to pave the way for development of a hepatitis A vaccine. After hepatitis A vaccine was licensed in 1995, national infection rates declined by 75 percent.

Did you know?
Provost first showed that marmosets and tamarins were good animal models to study hepatitis A infections.