Secondary school students develop China's first hepatitis A vaccine

Yin Weidong, who had been indefinable, had worked with the virus for more than 20 years to conquer countless viruses and obtained multiple firsts: the first inactivated hepatitis A vaccine in China, the first in the country and the second in the world. Vaccine, China's first human bird flu vaccine, the world's first SARS vaccine to complete phase I clinical research, the world's first hepatitis A vaccine. These are the results of the team he led.

But it is this fighter who has even had a virus, but because of a report he will be guilty.

He was invited by a secondary school to report on high school students. “They are high on one, it is certainly necessary to talk about the college entrance examination, college entrance examination are thought to go to Tsinghua University, Peking University.” But doing a good job for students, test scores, on the brand-name universities in this people's eyes, is not exactly the growth path Yin Weidong.

Secondary school education, ordinary school, but it does not affect his future success, "My colleagues and I often say, you must not underestimate yourself, I graduated from a technical secondary school, in the school eight hours of school virus I learned the curriculum, but I was able to isolate the Hepatitis A virus for the first time in the country. This logic is impossible now."

Yin Weidong frankly did not summarize or even think about his own growth laws. But one thing he thought was very important. “Learning itself is not for academic achievement.”

Middle school catches earthquake

The earthquake made Yin Weidong's middle school era a little different.

In 1964, Yin Weidong was born in Fengrun County, Tangshan City, Hebei Province. When the quake struck in 1976, he was in the second grade of junior high school. After the earthquake, the house collapsed and the campus was gone.

The rebuilding of the classroom after the earthquake became Yin Weidong’s learning process. The classroom was gone. The teacher took the students' own cover. He had to learn the code bricks and think about how to prevent earthquakes. Under the leadership of the teacher, he also planted willow trees with the classmates at the forest farm and pollinated the farmland.

These are different from formal classroom education. Without textbooks, students do not know how to pollinate and even spew the spores down when they plant trees. But in his opinion, as long as it is dry, it is a harvest.

The physics class in 1977 made Yin Weidong deeply remembered. In the first class, the teacher called the students in the yard. There was a tractor in the yard. Whoever passed the course was qualified. The examination did not require examination.

It may be unthinkable to put it in the current school, but in Yin Weidong's middle school era, such experiences abound.

He still remembers a lesson in the school woods: a small blackboard with half a box of chalk, and the teacher took the People's Daily and said, "People are conquering heaven."

Although it is wrong to understand that the idea of ​​"man wins the heavens" is wrong today, Yin Weidong said that the class gave him a belief at that time: No matter what difficulties he encountered, people must be able to overcome tribulations. This experience may explain why he successfully separated the hepatitis A virus after work.

After graduating from junior high school, Yin Weidong entered the historic Axle Hill Middle School.

At the time, the school’s pig farm killed one pig every two months to improve the food for the students. The pig's cry was extremely loud, and as soon as the second lesson of the pig was known, everyone became very excited. “We all put the lunch box in the doorway of the classroom, take a lesson, and rush out with the lunch box as quickly as an arrow.”

At that time, he was very affectionate with pigs, but learning did not improve. “When the college entrance examination was completed, the county had two classes. I was ranked in the top ten in our countdown.”

The impression left by Yin Weidong in secondary school education is "a highly flexible education with no special requirements and no particular interest".

Although he did not learn any book knowledge, he was exposed to the society. Yin Weidong “has a special respect for life”.

The school opened the door of interest

If he attends the college entrance examination again, Yin Weidong said with a smile that he may have a perfect score, such as hepatitis A virus.

Yin Weidong is most familiar with the Hepatitis A virus. Hepatitis A virus TZ84 was isolated in 1985 (still in use today). By 1999, Hepatitis A inactivated vaccine was developed. He and Hepatitis A virus have been inseparable. The successful separation of hepatitis A virus is also the first scientific research achievement in his life. This achievement has made his salary rise up to five levels and promoted to intermediate grade.

Someone wonders: How can students who are ranked in the bottom of high school be engaged in scientific research?

This benefits from Yin Weidong's medical knowledge system.

Middle school education did not help Yin Weidong to establish a real knowledge system. The actual establishment of Yin Weidong’s personal knowledge system was during the period of the school. It was this stage of learning that opened the door of Yin Weidong’s interest.

Looking back on that period of learning experience, he admitted that his degree of study in secondary school was much greater than when he was in high school, and "has suddenly become the most problematic student in schools."

Unlike secondary education, medical education in health schools is very systematic. Although there are mathematical and physical foundations, medical education is self-contained due to its own characteristics.

"The first thing is based on this discipline, to establish your own logic, and then to string together the knowledge, this thing is too fun. You can push from microbes to infectious diseases, from infectious diseases to pharmacology, from pharmacology to chemistry, from Chemistry is pushed to biochemistry."

In fact, he probably passed the school. In that year's college entrance examination, he took 249 points and was only 7 points away from the college's scoreline of 256 points. He wants to repeat the university exam.

"If you fail to go to the secondary school, it is not the talent that the country needs." The sentence of the head teacher made Yin Weidong give up the idea of ​​re-entering the university and enter the secondary school.

Two of the most fashionable things in society at the time: the steering wheel and the stethoscope were all favored by Yin Weidong. He wanted to get a stethoscope and he applied for a health school. He chose health education professionally and took the road to epidemic prevention. He founded Beijing Kexing Biological Products Co., Ltd. In his own words, he called it "From now on." 'No return'."

“The anatomy of that time, every bone, a section of a place to number what name, even the skin of the onion, the heart of the frog, to seriously learn. So suddenly drilled in, never thought again After I say that I am not going to go to college, I'll plunge into it."

Good school is not ideal

If you want to say what you want to say to high school students at the report meeting, Yin Weidong, who does not follow the usual route, really wants to say: "Learning and examinations have no inevitable connection between performance and ability."

In Yin Weidong’s view, the exams during the school period were filled in according to the contents of the books and were answered in a limited time. They only represented the contents of the book.

He believes that "the more odious is the so-called exam-oriented education." He uses the Pythagorean theorem as an example, the theorem itself is very simple, but in the exam-oriented education for the distance, Pythagorean Theorem was compiled into a variety of questions to embarrass everyone. The scores with the teacher's thoughts were high, and the scores that were stuck were low. However, in reality, this situation will not occur. "So that test score is not consistent with your actual ability."

Yin Weidong feels that when she is a child, she is interested in learning and she should also study for her ideals. The most important point is that "you shouldn't learn for performance only."

After graduating from technical secondary school, 80% of the students chose to enter tertiary education. Yin Weidong resolutely opposed it. He believes that his interest in infectious diseases, epidemics, microbiology, there is no need to waste time reading the physical and chemical exam college.

The pursuit of professionalism and business is the “special reverence ideal after Yin Weidong’s graduation from a technical secondary school”.

According to the situation at the time, students who graduated from technical secondary school were only the lowest doctors in the hospital, and they almost never became chief physicians. At most, they were an attending physician. Young but full of energy, he decided that his secondary school must be stronger than the university. "At that time, I was young and I was very strong. I was convinced that I was right. If I did well, I would do something."

With a vigor, Yin Weidong not only successfully isolated the Hepatitis A virus, but also, in the past 10 years, he has brought his team to record one record after another.

He and his team led the Phase I clinical trials of the SARS vaccine after more than 600 days and nights, making our country the first country in the world to enter clinical trials; they have developed a mythical speed of 87 days. The H1N1 flu vaccine is the world's first influenza A (H1N1) vaccine that has received the national (or regional government) drug approval number.

He is not a graduate of a prestigious university, not a master's degree (he studied at the National University of Singapore and obtained a master's degree in EMBA after he was established in Beijing Kexing), Ph.D., and colleagues who had studied with him during the virus separation went abroad and became officials. Yin Weidong Still insisting on one person. "For more than 20 years, I have been on the Hepatitis A virus. Why? Because I like to do this and I have a complex about studying infectious diseases. I have nothing else to do, I just do this. That no matter what others say, you have a voice." Do it in the end."

Many people now regard good universities as ideals, but Yin Weidong does not agree with them. Especially in contact with students who came out of some famous schools, he felt that their ideals were somewhat confused. "I don't think a good school is an ideal, an ideal is not a good school, the ideal is the pursuit of your highest goal. Then build your interest around your goals. You meet the interest, the goal is ahead, yours The goal will become even bigger and you will go back to school. This learning cycle is good."