Associate Scientific Director of Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa (CAPRISA)
President of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS)
Co-chair of UN 10-Member Group to support the Technology Facilitation Mechanism for SDGs (2021-2023)
Biography
Quarraisha Abdool Karim, (PhD) is an infectious diseases epidemiologist, co-founder and Associate Scientific Director of CAPRISA. She is Professor in Clinical Epidemiology, Columbia University, New York and Pro-Vice Chancellor for African Health, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Prof. Abdool Karim is the President of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) and co-chairs the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 10 Member Technology Facilitation Mechanism (TFM). She is the UNAIDS Special Ambassador for Adolescents and HIV, the Executive Group Member of the Steering Committees for the WHO Covid-19 Solidarity Therapeutics Trial, the WHO Covid-19 Solidarity Vaccines Trial and the WHO Ebola Vaccine Trial. Prof. Abdool Karim is a member of the PEPFAR Scientific Advisory Board and serves on the Board of Directors of Friends of the Global Fight Against AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (USA). Her seminal contributions spanning over three decades have shaped the global HIV prevention landscape, notably in prevention technologies for women. She demonstrated that ARVs prevent sexually transmitted HIV that laid the foundation for HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP); and has provided insights in Africa and globally on the impact of Covid-19 on HIV and in the evaluation of Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutics. She is the recipient of over 30 prestigious awards including the 2021 VinFuture Prize in the special category of developing country innovators, received in Vietnam.