Anthony Mbewu

Dr. Anthony Mbewu is a specialist in internal medicine and cardiology. He was Chief Executive Officer of the South African Government Printing Works from 2012 to 2017 spearheading the launch of South Africa’s electronic “smart ID card”. He also served as the President of the Medical Research Council of South Africa from 2005 to 2010; and Executive Director for Research there from 1996 to 2005. He studied medicine at the Universities of Oxford and London; and trained as a specialist in internal medicine and cardiology in Manchester before returning to South Africa in April 1994 after 27 years in exile. He has a management diploma from Harvard Business School. He was formerly an Honorary Professor in Cardiology and Internal Medicine at the University of Cape Town.

He sits on the Presidential Specialists’ Advisory Panel; and was an advisor on health research to former President Thabo Mbeki. He chaired the Ministerial National Task Team that prepared the ‘Operational Plan for the Comprehensive Prevention, Treatment and Care of HIV and AIDS in South Africa’ – a plan that has enrolled 5 million South Africans onto antiretroviral treatment since 2004. Prof Mbewu was Co-Chair of the Inter Academy Medical Panel (a body that represents 67 of the world’s Medical Academies); a member of the Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee of the Special Programme for Training and Research in Tropical Disease (TDR); and was Vice Chairperson of the Board of the Global TB Alliance. He has served as a Technical Advisor to WHO on numerous occasions.

He was a member of one of the World Bank taskteams that prepared the plan for the $1.6 billion Advanced Market Commitments fund to purchase pneumococcal vaccine to prevent childhood pneumonia in low income countries; which is now preventing hundreds of thousands of childhood deaths every year. He was also a member of the adjudication panel that selected the Academic Health Science Centres of the UK. Prof Mbewu has published over 50 peer-reviewed papers in mainly international journals; and presented over 40 papers and posters at national and international research meetings. He is a former Vice-President of the Academy of Science of South Africa; a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of the UK; and was elected as a Foreign Associate of the National Academy of Medicine of the USA for “an outstanding contribution to health”.