HAInews 2023/01 German Cancer Aid Award 2022 posthumously for alumna Martina Pötschke-Langer
Posthumous honour for alumna Dr Martina Pötschke-Langer: The long-time head of the Cancer Prevention Unit at the German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ), who died in June 2022, has been awarded the German Cancer Aid Prize 2022. The pionieer of non-smoker protection in Germany received the award together with the head of the DKFZ Division of Clinical Epidemiology and Ageing Research, Prof. Dr Hermann Brenner, who is a member of the Heidelberg University Medical Faculty.
Both were honoured for their valuable contributions in the field of cancer prevention, both in research and at the health policy and public level. It is largely thanks to Martina Pötschke-Langer's work that the protection of non-smokers was established in law in Germany after years of struggle. She died on 13 June 2022 at the age of 71. “We are very proud to be able to award Dr. Pötschke-Langer for her multifaceted commitment against tobacco consumption. With her health policy commitment, she has made an important contribution to the prevention of cancer,” said the President of German Cancer Aid, Anne-Sophie Mutter, at the award ceremony in December 2022.
Martina Pötschke-Langer studied German and history at Heidelberg University before going on to study medicine. She worked at the DKFZ for more than 30 years and headed the Cancer Prevention Unit from 1997 to 2016, as well as the Collaborating Centre for Tobacco Control of the World Health Organization (WHO) from 2002. At the end of 2005, Pötschke-Langer published a study according to which more than 3,300 non-smokers, about 60 of them infants, die every year in Germany from the consequences of passive smoking. This sensational result was one of the reasons why the federal states passed non-smoker protection laws in the following years, after a federal law had failed again and again in several attempts. In 2007, she was awarded the Cross of Merit on Ribbon of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for her extraordinary commitment to educating people about the risks of smoking and cancer prevention, and she also received several WHO honours.
Hermann Brenner received the German Cancer Aid Award for his achievements in the field of preventive oncology, especially the early detection of colorectal cancer. The internationally renowned epidemiologist is a member of the Heidelberg University Medical Faculty and the board of directors of the Netzwerk AlternsfoRschung (NAR).