A Rational Covid-19 Perspective - Half an hour with UCT Prof Linda-Gail Bekker, SA's global heavyweight

Globally, South Africans punch far above their weight in many fields. It's quite an achievement for a country with less than 1% of the global population to have given the world Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, Elon Musk, Trevor Noah and many of Europe's leading bankers. But until the coronavirus pandemic grabbed the national attention, apart from famous heart transplant pioneer Dr Chris Barnard the extraorodinary contribution by SA's scientists had passed most by. For instance, the country has produced a clutch of Nobel Prize winning scientists, one of whom, Prof Michael Levitt, is still very much alive. Among the SA heavyweights with huge global reputations is UCT Prof Linda-Gail Bekker, chief operating officer of the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation. Prof Bekker is the immediate past president of the 11 000 member International Aids Society which hosts the world's largest health or development event in the world; is a Rockefeller University alumnus (25 Nobel prizewinners); and an advisor to the US's massive Aids outreach programme PEPFAR. In this interview, which ranges from pre-exposure prophylaxis to protecting the elderly, from fake news to BCG, her contribution is pure quality. A rare Rational Perspective in an increasingly noisy Covid-19 landscape.