Impact
What the work gave humanity, and what it cost
Estimates of the real-world outcomes these laureates' work contributed to: lives saved, people fed, value created. Every number is a range, and each laureate is credited with only a conservative share.
109 of 223 researched profiles carry quantified claims; the rest are described in words, because some contributions cannot be counted honestly.
Who it helped
Children, the sick, the hungry and the poor
The credited estimates below, grouped by the people they reached. Some outcomes belong to more than one group, so the groups overlap and should not be added together.
Children
144–242thousand
young lives saved
Includes: Rh disease of the newborn prevented (anti-D immunoglobulin); Combination chemotherapy cure of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia; Diphtheria antitoxin serum therapy; and 2 more.
33–76million
children spared lifelong illness or infection
Includes: Hepatitis B vaccination (infant and adult vaccines); School-based mass deworming; Polio vaccination; and 2 more.
Infection
25–60million
lives saved from infectious disease
Includes: Penicillin as a mass-produced therapeutic antibiotic; Streptomycin and antibiotic cure of tuberculosis; mRNA vaccine platform (COVID-19 and beyond); and 6 more.
Hunger
1.4–1.6billion
people fed today by synthetic fertilizer
Includes: Synthetic ammonia and nitrogen fertilizer feeding billions.
Surgery and childbirth
18–60million
lives saved by safe blood transfusion
Includes: Safe blood transfusion and blood banking (ABO and Rh blood groups).
118–191thousand
people given a transplanted organ
Includes: Solid-organ transplantation; Kidney exchange (paired donation) transplants.
The heart and hormones
270–838thousand
lives saved from heart attacks, strokes and hormone failure
Includes: LDL receptor discovery and statin therapy for heart disease; Low-dose aspirin to prevent heart attacks and strokes; Adrenal hormone replacement for Addison's disease.
Cancer
51–75thousand
lives saved from cancer
Includes: Combination chemotherapy cure of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia; Cellular origin of oncogenes and targeted cancer therapy.
301–527thousand
patients treated with targeted cancer drugs and beams
Includes: Ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation and proteasome-inhibitor drugs; EGFR-targeted cancer drugs; Sipuleucel-T (Provenge) immunotherapy for prostate cancer; and 1 more.
Diagnosis
62–171million
patients diagnosed with scans these laureates made possible
Includes: Technetium-99m diagnostic nuclear imaging; Nuclear magnetic resonance, NMR spectroscopy and MRI medical imaging; Optical coherence tomography (OCT) eye imaging; and 2 more.
The mind
205–695thousand
people whose depression lifted on reuptake-inhibitor antidepressants
Includes: Reuptake-inhibitor antidepressants.
Poverty and work
490–812thousand
people lifted above the poverty line or kept in work
Includes: Earned Income Tax Credit lifting working families above the poverty line; Central-bank response to the 2008 financial crisis.
Only the laureates’ own discoveries and their immediate applications.
Totals
Credited totals across every confidence level. Choose a figure to chart it below.
Lives saved over time
Cumulative credited total, from the year each outcome began to 2025. The band is the low–high range.
Lives saved
More lives saved than Canada has people
Each circle’s area is proportional to a number of people. The solid black disc is the low estimate of lives saved by work credited to Jewish laureates, the hatched ring around it the high estimate, and the sand disc the whole population of Canada.
42–119 million
lives saved, from work credited to Jewish laureates
- 42 million low estimate
- 119 million high estimate
- Canada, its entire population: 40 million
Circle areas are to scale.
Even the low estimate is at least as many people as live in all of Canada.
How we computed this
We sum documented outcomes (vaccines, drugs, diagnostics) credited to Jewish laureates’ direct work. Each outcome’s low and high estimates are multiplied by the share of credit belonging to Jewish laureates, and outcomes shared by several laureates are counted once. The country shown is the largest one whose whole population is no bigger than the low estimate.
Top outcomes
Each row is one real-world outcome. When several laureates contributed, their shares are added (never above 100%) and the outcome is counted once.
| Outcome | Laureates | Whole outcome | Credited | Credited range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Central-bank response to the 2008 financial crisisEconomic value · Economy · direct · since 2008 | Douglas Diamond | $7–9.1 trillion | 6% | $420–546 billion |
| Monoclonal antibodies and the drugs built on themEconomic value · Economy · direct · since 1986 | César Milstein, Bruce A. Beutler | $2–2.6 trillion | 16% | $312–405.6 billion |
| Quantum mechanics as the foundation of semiconductors, lasers and modern electronicsEconomic value · Economy · direct · since 1955 | Zhores Alferov | $14.2–16 trillion | 0.3% | $42.6–48 billion |
| Auction theory and government spectrum auctionsEconomic value · Economy · direct · since 1994 | Paul R. Milgrom | $260–450 billion | 10% | $26–45 billion |
| Lasers and laser-based technologyEconomic value · Technology · direct · since 1960 | Arthur L. Schawlow | $293–475 billion | 3% | $8.8–14.3 billion |
| Synthetic indigo dyeEconomic value · Economy · direct · since 1897 | Adolf von Baeyer | $7–14 billion | 15% | $1.1–2.1 billion |
| Synthetic ammonia and nitrogen fertilizer feeding billionsPeople fed · Food · direct · since 1913 | Fritz Haber | 4.6–5.2 billion | 30% | 1.4–1.6 billion |
| Safe blood transfusion and blood banking (ABO and Rh blood groups)Lives saved · Health · direct · since 1915 | Karl Landsteiner | 60–200 million | 30% | 18–60 million |
| Hepatitis B vaccination (infant and adult vaccines)People benefited · Health · direct · since 1982 | Baruch S. Blumberg | 110–260 million | 20% | 22–52 million |
| Penicillin as a mass-produced therapeutic antibioticLives saved · Health · direct · since 1942 | Ernst B. Chain | 200–500 million | 10% | 20–50 million |
| Technetium-99m diagnostic nuclear imagingPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 1961 | Emilio Segrè | 580 million–1.3 billion | 3% | 17.4–39.9 million |
| School-based mass dewormingPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 2014 | Michael Kremer | 170–370 million | 5% | 8.5–18.5 million |
| Monoclonal antibodies and the drugs built on themPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 1986 | César Milstein | 15–60 million | 15% | 2.3–9 million |
| Salvarsan and the birth of targeted chemotherapyPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 1910 | Paul Ehrlich | 5–20 million | 40% | 2–8 million |
| Holocaust remembrance, testimony and educationPeople benefited · Education · direct · since 1993 | Elie Wiesel | 40–51 million | 15% | 6–7.7 million |
| Streptomycin and antibiotic cure of tuberculosisLives saved · Health · direct · since 1946 | Selman A. Waksman | 75–124 million | 5% | 3.8–6.2 million |
| Behavioral economics and nudge-based public policyPeople benefited · Economy · direct · since 2006 | Richard H. Thaler | 17–28 million | 15% | 2.5–4.2 million |
| Screening donated blood for hepatitis BPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 2008 | Baruch S. Blumberg, Harvey J. Alter | 1.6–6.2 million | 25% | 400,000–1.6 million |
| mRNA vaccine platform (COVID-19 and beyond)Lives saved · Health · direct · since 2020 | Drew Weissman | 870,000–8.9 million | 15% | 130,500–1.3 million |
| Low-dose EOS X-ray imagingPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 2008 | Georges Charpak | 1.6–4.5 million | 20% | 320,000–900,000 |
| Hepatitis B vaccination (infant and adult vaccines)Lives saved · Health · direct · since 1982 | Baruch S. Blumberg | 350,000–3.4 million | 20% | 70,000–680,000 |
| Screening donated blood for hepatitis CPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 1990 | Harvey J. Alter | 1.5–6.1 million | 10% | 150,000–610,000 |
| Central-bank response to the 2008 financial crisisPeople benefited · Economy · direct · since 2009 | Douglas Diamond | 4.5–4.9 million | 6% | 270,000–294,000 |
| Adrenal hormone replacement for Addison's diseaseLives saved · Health · direct · since 1940 | Tadeus Reichstein | 240,000–1 million | 10% | 24,000–100,000 |
| New York City high school admissions matchPeople benefited · Education · direct · since 2004 | Alvin E. Roth | 360,000–550,000 | 15% | 54,000–82,500 |
| Combination chemotherapy cure of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemiaLives saved · Health · direct · since 1960 | Gertrude B. Elion | 600,000–820,000 | 8% | 48,000–65,600 |
| Diphtheria antitoxin serum therapyLives saved · Health · direct · since 1895 | Paul Ehrlich | 190,000–720,000 | 8% | 15,200–57,600 |
| Pneumococcal vaccines in low-income countriesLives saved · Health · direct · since 2010 | Michael Kremer | 1.2–1.6 million | 3% | 36,000–48,000 |
| Acyclovir treatment of herpes simplex encephalitisLives saved · Health · direct · since 1984 | Gertrude B. Elion | 30,000–100,000 | 20% | 6,000–20,000 |
| Kidney exchange (paired donation) transplantsPeople benefited · Health · direct · since 2000 | Alvin E. Roth | 13,000–16,000 | 10% | 1,300–1,600 |
| Kidney exchange (paired donation) transplantsLives saved · Health · direct · since 2000 | Alvin E. Roth | 450–1,140 | 10% | 45–114 |
The harms ledger
Some of this work also caused great harm. We count it with the same method and show it here in full, direct and ripple alike, whatever the setting above.
- Deaths causedlow confidencedirect
Poison gas warfare in World War I
31,635–35,150
35% credited of 90,000–100,000 · Fritz Haber, Gustav Hertz, James Franck
- Deaths causedmedium confidencedirect
US bombing of Cambodia, 1969-1973
7,500–22,500
15% credited of 50,000–150,000 · Henry Kissinger
- Deaths causedlow confidencedirect
Atomic and thermonuclear weapons
11,040–18,106
7.4% credited of 150,000–246,000 · Henri Moissan, Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, James Franck, Isidor Isaac Rabi, Felix Bloch, Emilio Segrè, Eugene Wigner, Richard P. Feynman, Hans Bethe, Aage N. Bohr, Jerome Karle, Frederick Reines, Joseph Rotblat, Roy J. Glauber
- Deaths causedmedium confidenceripple
Indonesia's invasion and occupation of East Timor
1,816–3,660
2% credited of 90,800–183,000 · Henry Kissinger
- Deaths causedmedium confidencedirect
The 1982 Lebanon War
860–1,989
10% credited of 8,600–19,885 · Menachem Begin
- Deaths causedlow confidencedirect
Deaths from paracetamol (acetaminophen) overdose
230–1,325
5% credited of 4,600–26,500 · Julius Axelrod
- Deaths causedhigh confidencedirect
The 1946 King David Hotel bombing
36
40% credited of 91 · Menachem Begin
- Deaths causedmedium confidencedirect
Operation Grapes of Wrath in Lebanon, 1996
31
20% credited of 154 · Shimon Peres
- Deaths causedlow confidenceripple
Deaths in the revusiran RNAi drug trial
0–1
10% credited of 0–14 · Andrew Z. Fire
- People harmedlow confidenceripple
New-onset diabetes caused by statin therapy
262,500–637,500
13% credited of 2.1–5.1 million · Fritz Lipmann, Konrad Bloch, Joseph L. Goldstein, Michael S. Brown
- People harmedlow confidencedirect
Poison gas warfare in World War I
315,450–420,600
35% credited of 900,000–1.2 million · Fritz Haber, Gustav Hertz
- People harmedlow confidenceripple
Serious bleeding caused by low-dose aspirin
23,100–303,000
3% credited of 770,000–10.1 million · John R. Vane
- People harmedlow confidenceripple
Severe nerve damage from the proteasome inhibitor bortezomib
9,450–24,000
15% credited of 63,000–160,000 · Aaron Ciechanover, Avram Hershko, Irwin Rose
- People harmedlow confidencedirect
Myocarditis linked to mRNA COVID-19 vaccines
3,300–11,550
16% credited of 20,000–70,000 · François Jacob, Marshall W. Nirenberg, Sydney Brenner, Drew Weissman
- People harmedlow confidenceripple
Heart attacks linked to rofecoxib (Vioxx)
280–1,390
1% credited of 28,000–139,000 · John R. Vane
- Emissions causedlow confidenceripple
Greenhouse warming from sulfur hexafluoride emissions
70–78 million t CO₂e
1% credited of 7–7.8 billion t CO₂e · Henri Moissan
Both columns of the ledger use the same method: sourced ranges, a conservative share of credit, and each shared outcome counted once. The section below sets them against how human life changed over the same century.
Per person
Science prizes per person, by faith background
Physics, chemistry, medicine and economics only. Laureates per 10 million people with a Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist background, using the same population source (Pew, 2020) for every group.
Jewish background
133per 10 million
197 laureates · 14.8 million people (2020)
Muslim background
0.015per 10 million
3 laureates · 2 billion people (2020)
Hindu background
0.034per 10 million
4 laureates · 1.18 billion people (2020)
Buddhist background
0.031per 10 million
1 laureate · 324 million people (2020)
At the Jewish rate
If each group had won science prizes at the Jewish per-capita rate, the totals would exceed every science prize ever awarded.
The Jewish rate is 197 laureates for 14.8 million people. Applied to each group’s population, it gives the figures below. Only 757 people have ever won in these four fields, marked by the dark line.
Muslim background
26,622 at the Jewish rate · actual 3
35× every science laureate in history
Hindu background
15,678 at the Jewish rate · actual 4
21× every science laureate in history
Buddhist background
4,313 at the Jewish rate · actual 1
5.7× every science laureate in history
By field
Medicine and economics, per 10 million people
| Field | Jewish | Muslim | Hindu | Buddhist |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Medicinehealth and longevity | 4160 laureates | 00 laureates | 0.00851 laureate | 00 laureates |
| Economicsthe economy | 2740 laureates | 00 laureates | 0.00851 laureate | 00 laureates |
| Physics | 4160 laureates | 0.00501 laureate | 0.0172 laureates | 00 laureates |
| Chemistry | 2537 laureates | 0.0102 laureates | 00 laureates | 0.0311 laureate |
Who is counted
Jewish: the site’s 197 laureates in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics. Other groups: only laureates whose background is clearly documented. Anyone contested or only probable is left out.
- Muslim: Abdus Salam (1979), Ahmed Zewail (1999), Aziz Sancar (2015) · left out: Omar M. Yaghi (probable), Ferid Murad (disputed)
- Hindu: Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (1930), H. Gobind Khorana (1968), Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1983), Amartya Sen (1998) · left out: Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (probable)
- Buddhist: Hideki Shirakawa (2000) · left out: Tasuku Honjo (disputed)
Read with care
- Classifying people by religious background is imperfect. Many laureates did not write about their family's faith, and sources differ on some cases, so counts for non-Jewish groups are documented minimums.
- Religion is not the cause of any scientific achievement. These figures describe who won, not why.
- Access to universities, research funding and laboratories, colonial history, war and displacement, and the prize's historical concentration in Western Europe and North America shape these numbers far more than any group trait.
- Populations are 2020 snapshots (Pew, 2025), while prizes span 1901-2025. Group shares of world population changed over that period, so per-capita rates are approximate.
- The numerator counts heritage (a parent's background) while Pew counts current self-identification, which can inflate or distort per-capita rates, especially for small counts.
- Community tallies sometimes differ from these counts (for example, some Muslim tallies list 5 science laureates by including Moungi Bawendi). Those differences are listed as left out, above.
Sources (36)
- Muslim population change, 2010-2020, Pew Research Center
- How the Global Religious Landscape Changed From 2010 to 2020, Pew Research Center
- Abdus Salam, Wikipedia
- The Nobel gap: Reclaiming the Muslim legacy of knowledge, The Daily Star (Bangladesh)
- Interview with Ahmed Zewail (oral history), Caltech Archives
- Ahmed H. Zewail - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Ahmed Zewail, Wikipedia
- Aziz Sancar - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Aziz Sancar, Wikipedia
- Omar Yaghi Nobel Prize in Chemistry profile, Khaleej Times
- Omar M. Yaghi, Wikipedia
- Ferid Murad - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Ferid Murad, Wikipedia
- Moungi Bawendi, Wikipedia
- Moungi Bawendi: The Tunisian-American Chemistry Nobel Prize laureate, The National
- Leading Science: Muslim Nobel Laureates in Science, ILKE Foundation
- How the Global Religious Landscape Changed From 2010 to 2020 (full report PDF), Pew Research Center
- C. V. Raman, New World Encyclopedia
- C. V. Raman, Wikipedia
- Iyer, Wikipedia
- H. Gobind Khorana - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Har Gobind Khorana, Wikipedia
- Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, Wikipedia
- Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Amartya Sen - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Amartya Sen, Wikipedia
- Becoming Amartya Sen (review of Home in the World), New York Review of Books
- From Chidambaram to Cambridge: A Life in Science (Nobel autobiography), Nobel Foundation
- The Ashkenazim of India, American Enterprise Institute
- Abhijit Banerjee, Wikipedia
- Abhijit Banerjee - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Buddhist population change, 2010-2020, Pew Research Center
- Hideki Shirakawa - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Tasuku Honjo - Biographical, Nobel Foundation
- Honjo relatives in Toyama react (2018-10-02, archived), Kitanihon Broadcasting (KNB)
- Honjo Tasuku, Japanese Wikipedia
The world since 1900
The century these laureates helped change
Context, not credit: how human life changed while this work was done. Many people and forces drove these trends; the laureates' own shares are the estimates above.
Health
Global life expectancy at birth
years, 1900–2023
Children who die before their fifth birthday
% of live births, 1900–2024
Disease
Reported smallpox cases worldwide
reported cases per year, 1920–2023
One-year-olds given all three doses of diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine
% of one-year-olds, 1980–2024
Food
Daily food supply per person
kilocalories per person per day, 1961–2023
Cereal yields
tonnes per hectare, 1961–2024
Prosperity
Share of people in extreme poverty (long-run, cost of basic needs)
% of world population, 1900–2018
World GDP per person
international-$ (2011 prices), 1900–2022
Knowledge
Adult literacy rate
% of adults, 1900–2024
Share of people using the Internet
% of world population, 2005–2025
Freedom
Share of the world's population living in democracies
% of world population, 1900–2025
Countries where all adult women (and men) can vote
countries, 1900–2025
- A WHO-led modelling study published in The Lancet in 2024 estimated that vaccination against 14 diseases prevented about 154 million deaths in the 50 years after WHO's Expanded Programme on Immunization began in 1974.
- Of those deaths averted by vaccines since 1974, about 101 million would have been babies under one year old.
- The same study credits vaccination with about 40% of the drop in infant deaths worldwide over those 50 years (52% in the African region).
- Measles vaccines account for the largest single part of that total: nearly 94 million (93.7 million in the Lancet paper) of the 154 million deaths averted.
- WHO estimates that measles vaccination alone prevented nearly 59 million deaths between 2000 and 2024.
- Erisman and colleagues (Nature Geoscience, 2008) estimated that nitrogen fertilizer made with the Haber-Bosch process fed about 48% of the world's population in 2008, up from 44% in 2000.
How to read this
Direct, ripple, and credit
Direct
The laureate’s own discovery or invention and its immediate uses: streptomycin curing tuberculosis, for example.
Ripple
Downstream technologies the work made possible, such as quantum theory leading to modern electronics. These are modeled and usually lower confidence.
Credit
Each laureate gets a share of the outcome, split with co-discoverers and everyone else who was essential. Shared outcomes are counted once. Full method