Nobel Laureate Proposes national Service for Doctors to Revitalize U.S. Medical Research & Leadership
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Nobel Prize winner Robert Lefkowitz is advocating for a revamped national service program for physicians, potentially including a modernized draft, to bolster basic science research and cultivate stronger leadership within the U.S. healthcare system. The proposal, outlined in recent discussions, aims to address what Lefkowitz sees as a decline in the medical field’s commitment to fundamental physiological understanding and a corresponding weakening of research efforts.
Lefkowitz, reflecting on his own experience as a U.S. Public Health Service (USPHS) physician during the vietnam War era – part of a group known as the “Yellow Berets” - believes a similar, highly competitive, government-supported program could reignite a focus on basic science. “This is one that I happen to believe in very deeply but might potentially be totally impractical, but I keep hoping,” Lefkowitz said. He envisions a program offering research training opportunities modeled after the Yellow Berets, accepting onyl the most accomplished applicants and involving participation from leading mentors.
The Yellow Berets, comprised of physicians commissioned into the USPHS, conducted research while fulfilling their service obligations during the Vietnam War. Notably, the Class of 1968 included future Nobel laureates and prominent figures like Dr. Anthony Fauci, longtime director of the National Institute of allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIH). Raymond S. Greenberg’s book, “Medal Winners: How the Vietnam War Launched Nobel Careers,” details the success stories of these physicians. The program is also the subject of the podcast “Soldiers of Science: The Vietnam War, Anthony Fauci & the Doctors who Revolutionized American Medicine,” created by Alan Alda and Kate Rope.
Lefkowitz also suggested broadening the scope beyond medical professionals, advocating for a reinstitution of the draft with options for both military and othre forms of public service.
He noted with humor that Fauci, despite his prominent career and leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic, jokingly expresses an “inferiority complex” for not having received a Nobel Prize, a sentiment Lefkowitz and his peers regularly dismiss.
During their service, USPHS doctors were not required to wear military uniforms, but Lefkowitz and colleagues sometimes purchased and wore them for travel benefits, occasionally leading to amusing situations, such as a peer instinctively saluting a civilian airline pilot.
lefkowitz’s proposal comes amid concerns that medical education is increasingly prioritizing clinical practice over foundational scientific research, potentially hindering future medical advancements. He believes a renewed emphasis on basic science, coupled with a national service component, could address these challenges and strengthen the future of U.S. healthcare.
