José Baselga, MD, PhD, a prominent oncologist and former CMO of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, died March 21 at age 61.
Dr. Baselga died from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare, degenerative and fatal brain disorder, according to a GoFundMe page established by his daughter to raise donations for those on the front lines of cutting-edge neurodegenerative research.
"Patients, on average, live between 3 weeks and 6 months post the onset of symptoms. As a pre-med student, I studied the limited available research on the disease in college," Clara Baselga-Garriga wrote on the fundraising page. "Neurology professors loved to use CJD as an example of a field in which there remained ample progress to be made."
At the time of his death, Dr. Baselga served as executive vice president of oncology research and development for AstraZeneca. He joined the drug manufacturer in 2019.
Dr. Baselga previously led 2,000 physicians in his roles as physician-in-chief and CMO of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. After five years in the roles, he resigned in September 2018, shortly after an analysis by The New York Times and ProPublica revealed how he failed to disclose significant financial relationships in the industry in more than 100 papers he authored in the previous five years. He said the lapses in disclosure were unintentional and that his industry work was known among the public.
Before Memorial Sloan Kettering, Dr. Baselga was chief of the division of hematology and oncology and associate director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center and professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School in Boston. He also served as chairman of medical oncology and founding director of the Vall d 'Hebron Institute of Oncology in Barcelona, Spain.
"José built a world-class oncology R&D team who will miss him dearly, just as all his colleagues will throughout our entire company," AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot said in a statement. "José was more than a colleague to me. He was a friend, and someone I immensely respected and cherished. I will enormously miss having him alongside me, and I will continue to be inspired by his work and vision. My heart goes out to his wife Silvia and his four children."