José Baselga (Getty Images)

José Basel­ga, ac­claimed drug hunter, physi­cian and As­traZeneca's pi­o­neer­ing can­cer R&D chief, has died

José Basel­ga, the bril­liant on­col­o­gy R&D chief at As­traZeneca and a tow­er­ing fig­ure in can­cer drug de­vel­op­ment who had ear­li­er been chief med­ical of­fi­cer at Memo­r­i­al Sloan Ket­ter­ing, has died at the age of 61.

Basel­ga suc­cumbed to Creutzfeldt-Jakob dis­ease, a rapid­ly pro­gres­sive and lethal neu­rode­gen­er­a­tive dis­ease close­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with mad cow dis­ease that is trig­gered in about 1 in every mil­lion peo­ple.

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