Thanks to extensive vaccination, the incidence of tetanus in Europe is very low. Sufferers of spasticity of the muscles are helped by the research of Otto Kraupp, who developed a short-acting muscle relaxant. Kraupp studied medicine and chemistry at the University of Vienna, becoming associate professor in 1962 and full professor in 1968. From 1967 to 1971 he was director of the Pharmacological Institute of the University of Bochum, and until 1992 director of the Vienna Pharmacological Institute. At the Medical Faculty in Vienna, he was dean. Kraupp also played a major role in the creation of the Austrian Medicines Act in 1983.
For his more than 200 publications, he became a member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. The Society of Physicians in Vienna annually awards the Otto Kraupp Prize for the best medical habilitation accepted at an Austrian university.