South Africa's leading HIV research couple say the fight continues | National

Through decades of pioneering work in the fight against the spread of infectious diseases such as HIV, South African health expert couple Quarraisha and Salim Abdool Karim have saved thousands of lives.

The two 64-year-old epidemiologists have been married for 36 years and enjoy international recognition for their work in curbing deadly infections such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and the coronavirus.

On Thursday they received the Lasker Award for their services to medical research, a highest recognition that is considered the American equivalent of the Nobel Prize in Science.

The couple “stopped the spread of HIV/AIDS” by opening research laboratories and training hundreds of scientists across Africa, said the New York-based Lasker Foundation.

They used science to dispel myths and propaganda about AIDS, it was said.

The award was a “humbling moment” and “the highlight of a research career,” Salim told AFP at the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research (Caprisa), of which he is director, in the east coast city of Durban.

“Inspiring,” said Quarraisha, the center's scientific director, saying it shows “the transformative power of science being recognized, and from Africa.”

The couple focused on HIV after moving to the United States to pursue master's degrees at Columbia University in 1987. HIV – first reported in 1981 – was raging in New York.

– HIV explosion –

“In New York, not a day went by without people talking about HIV,” Salim recalls. When the couple returned to South Africa, that was the “next big challenge,” he says.

The country recorded one of the highest infection rates in the world and became the epicenter of a pandemic that, according to UNAIDS, has claimed around 42 million lives worldwide since 1999, including around 3.9 million in South Africa.

“It was in our communities, in our population. We were trying to change behaviour around sex at a time when people didn't talk about sex so easily, when the apartheid state was also trying to control who you had sex with,” Quarraisha said.

After the end of the racially segregated apartheid system in 1994, she was appointed head of the national AIDS control program.

But the new government denied the extent of HIV/AIDS, and its inadequate response cost an estimated 2.5 million lives between 1999 and 2010, according to UNAIDS.

The Lasker Award citation states: “Despite objections from the South African government, their research led to the development of the antiretroviral treatment, pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), which reduced the spread by 39 percent.”

“They defined approaches to treat common HIV-tuberculosis co-infections, and after five years, these deaths fell by over 50 percent.”

One of Caprisa's achievements was the development of a topical gel to protect women from infections.

In South Africa, the number of new infections has fallen from a peak of around 520,000 in 2000 to 150,000 in 2023. Up to 8.3 million people in the country were infected with the virus in 2023.

The most common causes of new infections are violence against women, relationships between young women and older men and sexual exchanges between partners, Quarraisha said.

– “Complementary Perspectives” –

Salim became a household name in South Africa as a government advisor during the Covid-19 pandemic, appearing frequently on television to provide thoughtful advice and updates.

“Now when I go to the mall, people come up to me and say, 'Thank you, professor,'” he said.

The couple were born in the province of KwaZulu-Natal and spend a lot of time with their three children, but have no plans to hang up their lab coats.

Quarraisha would like to see greater global cooperation in public health and the development of African talent and initiative.

“When we work together, as my husband and I demonstrate, we bring different but complementary perspectives,” she said. “We are able to take science to a level that cannot be achieved alone.”

“We are currently working on new strategies for long-term prevention of HIV,” Salim said. “We have some really good innovations and some good research underway. This will keep us busy for quite some time.”

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