Professor Salim Abdool Karim

Salim S. Abdool Karim, FRS, is a South African clinical infectious diseases epidemiologist widely recognized for his scientific contributions and leadership in the fields of AIDS and COVID-19.

He is the Director of the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa (CAPRISA), Durban, and Professor of Global Health at Columbia University, New York. He serves as Special Advisor on Pandemics to the World Health Organization Director-General.

He is an Adjunct Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard University, an Adjunct Professor of Medicine at Cornell University, and Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

His research on TB-HIV treatment shaped international guidelines on the clinical management of co-infected patients. He co-led the CAPRISA 004 trial, which provided proof of concept for antiretroviral pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). He is a co-inventor on HIV vaccine and broadly neutralizing antibody patents.

He has more than 500 peer-reviewed publications and has been ranked among the world’s most highly cited scientists by Web of Science. He serves on the boards of the New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet Global Health, and The Lancet HIV. His many awards include the Lasker Prize, the Canada Gairdner Award, and Africa’s most prestigious scientific award, the African Union’s Kwame Nkrumah Prize.

He is a member of the US National Academy of Medicine and a Fellow of the Royal Society.