Quarraisha Abdool Karim, is a world renowned South African infectious diseases epidemiologist and co-founder of the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa (CAPRISA), where she is the John C. Martin Chair in Global Health and Associate Scientific Director. She is Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at Columbia University, New York and Pro Vice-Chancellor Health Sciences at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban South Africa.
Abdool Karim’s work has profoundly influenced the global HIV prevention landscape over the past three decades, particularly in enhancing understanding of the evolving HIV epidemic and developing prevention technologies for women. Her groundbreaking research has transformed HIV prevention for women in Africa. As co-leader of the CAPRISA 004 trial, she demonstrated the efficacy of tenofovir gel in reducing HIV acquisition, establishing proof of concept for antiretroviral-based prevention. Her research also highlighted the role of genital inflammation in enhancing HIV acquisition. She also provided key insights into HIV-tuberculosis (TB) co-infection and the impact of COVID-19 on HIV.
She is currently President of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) (the first women in this position in its 40 year history) and UNAIDS Special Ambassador for Adolescents and HIV. Abdool Karim chairs the PEPFAR Scientific Advisory Board and serves on several boards including the Global Health Innovative Technology (GHIT) Fund, Japan; the Global Virus Network; the U.S. Friends of the Global Fight Against AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. She is a member of the Steering Committees of the World Science Forum, Science and Technology for Society Forum, and the Forum on Big Data and Sustainable Development, as well as the WHO Executive Groups for the COVID-19 Solidarity Therapeutics and Vaccines Trials.
Professor Abdool Karim has authored more than 300 peer-reviewed publications in leading journals, including Science, Nature, The New England Journal of Medicine, and The Lancet, and co-edited key reference works such as the Oxford Textbook of Global Public Health and HIV in South Africa. Through the Columbia University–Southern African Fogarty AIDS International Training and Research Programme, she has played a pivotal role in strengthening southern Africa’s science base by training over 600 researchers in HIV and TB.
She is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Indian Academy of Sciences; Fellow of: TWAS, the Royal Society, International Science Council, the Chinese Academy of Sciences Centre for Big Data and AI (CBAS), the African Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of South Africa, and the Academy of Science of South Africa. She has received multiple honorary doctorates and has been inducted to the Order of Mapungubwe, South Africa’s highest national honour. Her contributions have been recognised with more than 40 major awards, including the inaugural African Academy of Science Olusegun Obasanjo Prize for Scientific Breakthrough and/or Technological Innovation, the TWAS-Lenovo Science Award; L’Oréal-UNESCO Women in Science Award (MENA region), the Canada Gairdner Global Health Award, the Noguchi Africa Prize, the Virchow Award and the Lasker-Bloomberg Public Service Award.