The Nobel Assembly has dismissed Karolinska Institute's Harriet Wallberg and Anders Hamsten following their roles in the medical scandal involving the work of Paolo Macchiarini, an Italian surgeon.
Talking to TT, a Swedish news agency, panel secretary Thomas Perlmann said Wallberg and Hamsten will be asked to leave the 50-member group that awards the Nobel Prize for medicine.
"Confidence in the two presidents ... is so extremely damaged that it has been exhausted. The damage is so great and of such a nature that we invite them to resign from the Nobel Assembly," he said.
The Nobel Assembly doesn't have a formal way of removing members but a call to resign has the same effect.
According to Perlmann, the two are expected to resign but whether or not they choose to do so, they will not be allowed to participate in any kind of Nobel work ever again.
Where the Nobel Assembly is tasked with choosing the recipient for the Nobel Prize in medicine, the Nobel Committee is in charge of putting forth nominations.
Wallberg was the Karolinska Institute's president when Macchiarini was hired. Hamsten, on the other hand, was the president when the scandal involving the Italian surgeon broke out.
According to Reuters, however, the entire Karolinska Institute board will be replaced. Those who have not quit when a new panel has been recruited will be replaced by the Swedish government.
"Scandal is the right word. People have been harmed because of the acting of the Karolinska Institute and also the Karolinska University Hospital," said Helene Hellmark Knutsson, Sweden's Minister for Higher Education and Research.
Macchiarini was fired in March for falsifying information on his CV and demonstrating scientific negligence. He performed three surgeries where artificial trachea coated in stem cells were transplanted onto patients when the procedure has not been sufficiently studied. The operations were also not deemed to be life-saving to warrant expediency. Two of Macchiarini's patients have died while one remains in the hospital.
The Karolinska Institute canceled Macchiarini's contract as a surgeon in 2013 but kept him around as a basic regenerative medicine researcher. It was in 2014 when allegations of his misconduct started to come to light.
Authorities have launched an investigation into Macchiarini's work, citing involuntary manslaughter. The Italian surgeon, however, disputes all charges.
The recipient (or recipients) of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Medicine is set to be announced on Oct. 3 at the earliest. Bo Risberg, former ethics committee head of the Karolinska Institute, said the award should be put on hold for two years, with the prize money instead used to compensate the families of the patients Macchiarini performed surgery on.
