Michael Rawlins

Sir Michael David Rawlins (28 March 1941 – 1 January 2023) was a British clinical pharmacologist and emeritus professor at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. During his medical career he chaired several executive agencies including the Committee on Safety of Medicines from 1993 to 1998, followed by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) for 14 years from its formation in 1999 and then the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) for six years from 2014. From 2012 to 2014 he was president of the Royal Society of Medicine.

Rawlins delivered several eponymous lectures during his medical career including the 2008 Harveian Oration at the Royal College of Physicians (RCP), where he argued that there were other ways of collecting useful clinical evidence other than only randomised controlled trials and he encouraged a range of methods to provide a more holistic evaluation. For his contributions to protecting people from the side-effects of medicines he was knighted in 1999, and for his services to the safety of medicines, healthcare, and innovation he was appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE) in 2017.

Early life and education Michael Rawlins was born in Shrewsbury, Shropshire on 28 March 1941. His father was the Reverend Jack Rawlins, vicar of Northwood-on-Trent in Staffordshire, and his mother was Evelyn Daphne Douglas-Hamilton who following the death of his father later married a general practitioner. He attended Uppingham School, Rutland, with David Li and left there in 1959. In 1962 he graduated first class from University of London. He obtained his medical degree from St Thomas' Hospital in 1965.

Career Rawlins completed his house jobs in 1967; firstly, in surgery at St Thomas' and then in medicine at Portsmouth. There, one of his early roles was the decision not to approve wide use of Relenza for flu.

In 2010, he helped establish the all-party parliamentary group for Huntington's disease in the UK Parliament, supported by more than 40 MPs and peers. From 2012 to 2019 he was chair of UK Biobank. In November 2014 the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) announced the appointment of Rawlins as its new chair, succeeding Gordon Duff. The appointment was renewed for a further three years in 2017.

Eponymous lectures Rawlins delivered several eponymous lectures at the RCP, including the Bradshaw Lecture in 1986. In 1994 he gave the RCP's William Withering lecture. In it, contrary to the widely held belief that digitalis would unlikely pass modern day licensing regulations, he said of Withering's 1785 An account of the foxglove and some of its medical uses ... "Its contents would do justice to an expert report accompanying a Product Licence application to the drug regulatory authority of any state in the European Union". The lecture called for abandoning hierarchy of evidence at a time when Rawlins headed NICE, the UK's main independent agency whose purpose was to assess scientific evidence of medical treatments. The problem with RCTs, he stated, is that they are too generalised. He pointed out that science includes the not so exact but important "judgement". Rawlins quoted William Blake's observation .. "God forbid that truth should be confined to mathematical demonstration", In 2012 he received the Prince Mahidol Award for his contribution to medicine. Zenith Global Health awarded him their Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019.

Rawlins was knighted in the 1999 New Year Honours for services to the improvement of patient protection from the side-effects of medicines, and was appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE) in the 2017 Birthday Honours for services to the safety of medicines, healthcare, and innovation.

Personal and family In 1963 he married Elizabeth Hambly, a nurse; they divorced in 2005. At the time of his death he was honorary professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, University of London, and emeritus professor at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. Rawlins is survived by his daughters Vicky, Lucy, and Suzannah, and eight grandchildren.

Selected publications Articles

Books