South African medical research pioneer listed as 1 of the 100 most influential people in the world
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2012
Burnaby, Canada
She holds an honorary doctorate from Simon Fraser University awarded in 2012.
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2013
She was awarded South Africa's highest honor, the Order of Mapungubwe (Silver).
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2013
She was awarded South Africa's highest honor, the Order of Mapungubwe (Silver).
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2014
Dr. Glenda Gray welcomes HIV Vaccine Trials Network members to an HVTN conference in Seattle in October 2014.
Photo by Robert Hood / Fred Hutch News Service
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2016
Dr Glenda Gray, SAMRC President speaking on HIVR4P 2016
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2017
New York City, United State
Physician and scientist Glenda Gray attends the 2017 Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017 in New York City.
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2017
New York City, United State
Physician and scientist Glenda Gray attends the 2017 Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017 in New York City.
Gallery of Glenda Gray
2017
New York City, United State
Physician and scientist Glenda Gray (R) attends the 2017 Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017 in New York City.
Achievements
Membership
Academy of Science of South Africa
US Institute of Medicine, National Academies
Academy of Microbiology
Awards
Nelson Mandela Award for Health and Human Rights
2002
Dr. Glenda Gray in 2002 received the Nelson Mandela Health and Human Rights Award.
Honorary Doctorate in science from the Simon Fraser University
2012
Burnaby, Canada
She holds an honorary doctorate from Simon Fraser University awarded in 2012.
Order of Mapungubwe
2013
She was awarded South Africa's highest honor, the Order of Mapungubwe (Silver).
EDCTP Outstanding African Scientist Award
2013
In 2013, she received the EDCTP Outstanding African Scientist award.
Dr. Glenda Gray welcomes HIV Vaccine Trials Network members to an HVTN conference in Seattle in October 2014.
Photo by Robert Hood / Fred Hutch News Service
Glenda Elisabeth Gray is a South African physician and scientist specializing in the care of children and in HIV medicine.
Background
Gray was born on December 14, 1962, in Boksburg. Her father was a miner and her mother was a bookkeeper. They lived in a conservative poor area of South Africa. Her family was not conservative, but radical, and they integrated into the black community. She was the fifth of six children who nearly all gained degrees and three of them took higher degrees. Gray's father had been to college and he was ambitious for his children including Glenda who from the age of six wanted to be a doctor.
Education
Glenda obtained her MBBCh degree from the Wits Medical School and completed a Fellowship in Paediatrics and Child Health at the Colleges of Medicine of South Africa. She studied at University of the Witwatersrand in 1980 for six years and where she later worked.
In 1999, Dr Gray received a Fogarty Training Fellowship at Columbia University in the US and completed an intensive training programme on clinical epidemiology at Cornell University, USA.
Glenda has worked as medical officer at various South African hospitals, including Coronation and Chris Hani Baragwanath, as well as the Wits Department of Paediatrics and Neonatology. She is currently executive director of the Wits Perinatal HIV Research Unit, and co-principal investigator and director of international programmes of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded HIV Vaccine Clinical Trial Network. Dr Gray’s research has contributed significantly to the understanding of HIV. Her research into post-exposure prophylaxis for PMTCT has led to the development of clinical guidelines that have been adopted internationally.
Glenda has also been engaged in advancement of HIV vaccine research and has led the clinical development of South Africa’s first two HIV vaccines, the SAAVI DNA and MVA vaccines. She is the principal investigator at the Soweto Clinical Trials Unit, which has five clinical research sites funded by the NIH and are conducting research in HIV treatment and prevention. She is also the site investigator for Project Accept, a large multi-study community randomised trial funded by the National Institute of Mental Health that looks at the impact of behavioural interventions in reducing HIV incidences. She is a National Research Foundation A-rated researcher.
Since 2003, Dr Gray has contributed three book chapters and 193 peer-reviewed articles. She is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of AIDS as well as AIDS Research and Treatment, and has reviewed numerous local and international journals. She is a member of the scientific steering committees for the International Congress on Drug Therapy and the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), and chaired the IAVI Meeting in 2010.
Glenda campaigned to de-segregate South African hospitals.
Quotations:
"Now we begin a scientific exploration that could hold great promise for our country."
Membership
Dr Gray is a member of the Academy of Science and chairs its standing committee on health. She was elected into the US Institute of Medicine, National Academies, as a foreign associate in 2011. She was also elected as a fellow of the Academy of Microbiology.
Academy of Science of South Africa
US Institute of Medicine, National Academies
Academy of Microbiology
Connections
Glenda has three children. One of Gray’s daughters is now a 21-year-old college student, the other a 17-year-old in high school. She also has an 11-year-old son. Her husband, Jacobus Kloppers, is a well-known South African artist.
Glenda's oldest child has just completed a documentary — a school project — on HIV vaccines. She recently found video footage of her mother at a protest.