Irish rugby legend gets kick out of medical ‘Oscar’ win

LEGENDARY rugby player and missionary doctor Jack Kyle was last night presented with a lifetime achievement award at this year’s Doctor Awards, known as the Irish “Medical Oscars.”

This was in recognition of his unique sporting and humanitarian contributions.

Described as the finest out-half ever to draw breath, Dr Kyle first hit the headlines as a young medical student when Ireland captured its first Grand Slam in 1948 and followed this historic achievement with winning the Triple Crown in 1949.

Dr Kyle and his teammates won the Five Nations Championship once more in 1951. And before ending his international career in 1958, Dr Kyle became the most capped Irish fly-half.

But the doctors who honoured Dr Kyle in Dublin last night hailed the decades of selfless work by the sportsman in the developing world after his rugby career.

The Belfast-born doctor worked as a consultant surgeon from 1966 to 2000 in Chingola in the central African state of Zambia and also became involved in humanitarian work in Sumatra and Indonesia.

However, the event’s top accolade — Doctor of the Year — was presented to Ireland’s leading authority on viruses, Prof William Hall, who was also praised for his pioneering work in the area of cancer.

Prof Hall, a consultant microbiologist at St Vincent’s University Hospital in Dublin, has studied the family of viruses known as human T-lymphotropic viruses, which are associated with the development of disorders, including leukaemia and lymphoma.

Prof Hall and his team obtained outside funding for their research from the Japanese Foundation for AIDS prevention.