Professor Helen Rees

Professor Helen Rees is the founder and Executive Director of Wits RHI of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, a UNAIDS collaborating Centre. Helen is an Ad Hominem Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Wits. She is an Honorary Professor in the Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases of the Clinical Research Unit at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, where she is also the 2010 Heath Clark lecturer.  Helen received her Medical Degree and a Masters in Social and Political Sciences from Cambridge University and in 2002 became an alumnus of Harvard Business School. She holds a Doctor of Science (Medicine) honoris causa from the University of London and a Doctor of Law honoris causa from Rhodes University.

Helen is internationally recognised as an award-winning global health practitioner who has dedicated her professional career to improving public health in Africa, with a focus on vaccine-preventable diseases, HIV and sexual and reproductive health. Helen has advised the South African Department of Health extensively on a range of topics related to HIV, sexual and reproductive health, vaccines and pandemic preparedness since the inception of a democratic South Africa.

Helen has served on and chaired many national and global scientific committees and boards. Helen is a member of the South African National Advisory Group on Immunisation, and co-chairs the NAGI Mpox Working Group. Helen co-chairs South Africa’s Mpox Incident Management Team, overseeing the national mpox response. Helen has recently been appointed as co-chair of the WHO Poxvirus Collaborating Centre under the recently released prioritized pathogen family report by the WHO R&D Blueprint.  Recognized as a global leader in global health security, Helen has served on and chaired a number of WHO Committees, including the WHO’s IHR Emergency Committee on Polio, the SAGE working group on Ebola Vaccine, and the WHO IHR Committee on Mpox, responsible for issuing standing recommendations. Helen chairs the WHO’s African Regional Technical Advisory Group on Immunization. She is a member of the WHO African Regional Emergency Preparedness and Response Technical Advisory Group.  Helen is a member of the WHO’s Scientific and Technical Advisory Group on Infectious Hazards and a steering committee member of the Coalition for Clinical Research for Pandemics in LMICs.  Helen chairs the MedAccess Board, a global not-for-profit organisation that uses innovative funding mechanisms to support access to neglected therapeutics and diagnostics required in Low Middle-Income Countries.  Helen recently completed an eight-year term as Chair of the South African Health Products.

Helen is widely respected for her ability to synthesize recommendations from multifaceted inputs and to link research to policy and have successfully chaired many national, regional and global committees in deliberations that have changed key strategies and policies in the African region, and has served on expert structures and committees for WHO, UNAIDS, UNICEF, the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Currently, she is a member of the Lancet Commission on evidence-based implementation.

Helen has won many international and national awards for her contribution to global health and to science, including being made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) in 2001 by Queen Elizabeth II.  In 2016, she was awarded the South African National Order of the Baobab for her contribution to medicine and to medical research. In 2022, Helen was made an Officer of the French National Order of Merit by President Macron for her contribution to global health and to the COVID-19 response, and she also received the Platinum South African National Batho Pele Award for excellence in contribution to the South African COVID-19 response. In 2022, she was named a ‘standout voice’ in African public health by Harvard Public Health. In May 2025, Helen received the prestigious Dr Lee Jong-wook Memorial Prize for Public Health from the World Health Organization, one of the highest global honours in the field of public health. This award recognises her exceptional contributions to global health, particularly in vaccine research, outbreak response, and health equity. In addition to this accolade, Helen was elected a Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences (AAS) in 2025, joining a distinguished network of scholars committed to advancing science and innovation across the African continent.