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As a global leader in HIV prevention research, Gita Ramjee inspired scientists and activists around the world through her impassioned advocacy for women. The personable, well-connected South African devoted much of her career to helping the most vulnerable, in particular African women dealing with the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Colleagues and admirers pointed to her efforts fighting AIDS denialism with science and evidence, teaching treatment literacy, and explaining science and arming activists for advocacy. In the process, she set an example for the impact and leadership a woman from sub-Saharan Africa can demonstrate in the fields of science and medicine.
A virologist by training, Ramjee dedicated her career to eradicating HIV, yet it was another virus, COVID-19, that took her life on March 31, just a week before her 64th birthday.
On March 17, Ramjee was in London to present a webinar at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine entitled “HIV: Diverse challenges among children and women in Asia and Africa.” She flew back to South Africa the following weekend, and soon thereafter felt unwell and was hospitalized. According to the South African Medical Research Council, Ramjee died at a hospital near her home in Durban, South Africa, after suffering from coronavirus-related complications. News reports made no mention of pre-existing conditions.
“In her, we have indeed lost a champion in the fight against the HIV epidemic, ironically at the hands of this global pandemic,” said David Mabuza, Deputy president of South Africa and chairman of the South African National AIDS Council, in a statement. “In her honor, we should heed the call to flatten the curve by strengthening our responses to this global pandemic as well as continue the fight to achieve zero new HIV infections.”
Born Gita Parekh in Uganda on April 8, 1956, Ramjee’s family was driven into exile in the 1970s in response to Idi Amin’s dictatorship, during which he persecuted ethnic groups and political dissidents. After completing high school in India, Ramjee graduated from the University of Sunderland in England, where she met and then married a fellow student of South African-Indian origin, Praveen Ramjee. In the 1980s, the couple moved to Durban, where her husband became a pharmacist and Ramjee worked in the Department of Pediatrics at the Medical School of the University of KwaZulu-Natal. After giving birth to two sons, she completed her master’s and earned a Ph.D. on the kidney diseases of children in 1994.
As she embarked on her career during a period when her adopted homeland confronted the largest HIV epidemic in the world, Ramjee became a champion of human rights and equality, promoting activism designed to support the least fortunate, while ensuring that the subjects of HIV research also benefited from its findings.
In 1996, she led a trial on microbicides—vaginal gels and creams designed to protect women from HIV—among a group of sex workers in Durban, and soon thereafter she committed herself to women-initiated HIV prevention technologies.
Ramjee became one of the first female research directors at the South African Medical Research Council in the late 1990s, and went on to serve as an honorary professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the University of Washington in Seattle, and the University of Cape Town. She also co-chaired the International Partnership for Microbicides conferences in 2006, 2008, and 2010, and in 2012 was honored with a lifetime achievement award.
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As one of the first South African scientists working in the field of microbicides, Ramjee was intimately involved in nearly every study taking place in the country, either conducting the research herself or advising other scientists. In various tributes, she was recognized for her pioneering research and as an inspirational role model for women scientists in South Africa and beyond.
At the time of her death, Ramjee held the position of chief scientific officer at the Aurum Institute, a Johannesburg-based nonprofit research organization regarded as a global authority on HIV and TB eradication. Through the institute, Ramjee worked to improve the health of communities through prevention, research, and innovation.
“The world has lost a bold and compassionate leader in the response to HIV,” said Gavin Churchyard, founder and CEO of the Aurum Institute, in a statement. “Gita Ramjee firmly believed in health as a fundamental human right. Her groundbreaking research in HIV prevention contributed to the global response to HIV and AIDS.”
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“Deeply saddened at the news of the passing of Gita Ramjee,” said Winnie Byanyima, executive director of UNAIDS, the joint United Nations program on HIV/AIDS, in a statement. “An eminent scientist who dedicated her life to HIV prevention for women and girls in Africa and ending AIDS. A huge loss at a time when the world needs her most.”
Ramjee is survived by her husband, two sons and a grandson.
