I'm not sure that it would be correct to interpret Kuhn as stating that paradigm shifts only occur upon death. His point was rather than science
often doesn't proceed in the orderly way that we've typically been led to believe.
Often does not preclude
sometimes, or even
frequently.
I don't know much about molecular biology (other than currently working on RNA Interference now for a living), but sometimes, I imagine, that there is just too much solid data for a shift, that the orthodoxists don't need to die to see the light. Or maybe these putative shifts don't really involve shifting your entire mindset, which was required for things like the shift from classical mechanics to quantum mechanics, or the shift from behavioral psychology to cognitive psychology. Kuhn's model of paradigm shift only applies if the paradigm has to change--not if there's just a lot of churning of the facts.
The shift from behaviorism to cognitivism was one that occurred relatively recently in the history of science, and it certainly involved dramatic wailing and the gnashing of teeth. In fact, there are still behaviorist holdouts.
Re relativity and quantum mechanics, these would be two of Kuhn's prime examples, so I'm not sure what you are saying with respect to them. Einstein didn't win a Nobel Prize for Relativity, because it still wasn't accepted well enough even all those decades later, when he did win his Nobel prize.