Doctor receives first OU prize for water safety

BY JAMES S. TYREE Comments 0
Published: October 24, 2009

NORMAN — Dr. Stephen Luby is taking a break this week from studying water safety in Bangladesh, where he has lived since 2004, to accept the first University of Oklahoma International Water Prize.

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Luby works for the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, where he is with the Program on Infectious Diseases and Vaccine Sciences. Luby said he was honored to be recognized but initially wasn’t keen on leaving Bangladesh to receive the award.

"I was thinking I’d be more comfortable not going to Oklahoma and instead doing the work that had to be done in Bangladesh,” he said Thursday at Oklahoma Memorial Union.

"But then I thought about the social take within this community and society,” he continued, "especially in this area of safe water, and I think it’s exciting that they want to put a focus on this kind of work.”

The new biennial international prize is sponsored by the Water Technologies for Emerging Regions (WaTER) Center at OU, and Luby is the first winner. Luby will receive $25,000 (half of which will go to the water-related nonprofit organization of his choice), a bronze plaque and a silver WaTER symbol.

Luby will be honored during the 2009 OU International WaTER Conference, which is Monday through Wednesday at the university’s Thurman J. White Forum Building. The prize presentation is part of a Tuesday night banquet.

Luby earned a philosophy degree from Creighton University. He earned his medical degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School at Dallas in 1986.

Since 1992, Luby’s efforts have focused on conducting public health research in low-income countries with a focus on improving drinking water quality and handwashing practices.

Luby said unsafe water is one of the world’s biggest problems.