Simon Campbell, who was responsible for the development of sildenafil (Viagra) during his time as senior vice president for worldwide discovery at Pfizer, has received a knighthood in the 2015 New Year’s Honours, which recognise the achievements and service of people across the UK.
During his 26 years with Pfizer, Campbell also worked on the discovery of two other important new medicines: amlodipine (Istin), a calcium channel blocker used for the treatment of hypertension and angina; and doxazosin (Cardura), a selective alpha blocker used to treat high blood pressure and benign prostatic hyperplasia.
Awards made under the health and science and technology banners in the list made up 10% of all honours, although none were made explicitly for services to pharmacy.
Sir John Bell, the founder of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, received a Knight Grand Cross for his services to medicine, medical research and the UK life science industry. And Rosalind Smyth, director of the Institute of Child Health, University College London, received a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) for her work on the regulation of medicines for children.
