But Blumberg had little time to mull over these conflicts, and he certainly had no theoretical axes to grind about viruses and cancer. A pragmatist, he directed his team toward finding a vaccine for HBV. By 1979, his group had devised one. Like the blood-screening strategy, the vaccine did not, of course, alter the course of the cancer after its genesis, but it sharply reduced the susceptibility to HBV infection in uninfected men and women. Blumberg had thus made a critical link from cause to prevention. He had identified a viral carcinogen, found a method to detect it before transmission,
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