Julia Blitz is a registered Family Physician who has a PhD in Health Professions Education (HPE) from Stellenbosch University. While now retired from full-time work, she continues to work with some South African medical schools (including NWU) as they develop or renew their medical programmes.

She was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of General Practitioners (UK) in recognition of her “major contribution internationally to both undergraduate education and postgraduate training in the context of Family Medicine”.

I served as a Family Medicine specialist in the public health sector, translating to a senior health system leader for 30 years. The last 5 years I served as Head of Health for the Western Cape, accountable for all health services, resources and performance. Included in the responsibilities was to manage the relationship and interface between the Health Department and 4 Western Cape HEIs (UCT, UWC, CPUT, SU). During the HOD tenure I was recognized as the best performing Head of Department across all departments, also achieving the first clean audit for any health department at the time.

Dr Xander Flemming is a lecturer and researcher at the Africa Unit for Transdisciplinary Health Research (AUTHeR). After obtaining a master’s degree in counselling psychology, he gained over 12 years of experience in community settings. He managed and implemented mental health and psycho-social well-being programs and sexual health and HIV/STI prevention programs for marginalised groups in resource-limited settings in South Africa. He has worked at a national level and across various sectors, including public health, health promotion, the NGO/CBO sector and corporate social investment.

During the period 2009-2013 I was head of the biostatistics Unit and responsible for clinical epidemiology in two main research hospital in Milan (Italy). Afterwards, during the period the period 2013-2015, I joined the department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine of the University of Regensburg (Germany). In 2015-2016 I joined the Nutritional Methodology and Biostatistics Group at the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization in Lyon (France).

Tamrin Veldsman is a lecturer, and emerging expert, in the School of Human Movement Sciences in the Subject Group: Biokinetics at the North-West University (Potchefstroom Campus) in South Africa. Tamrin is a registered biokineiticist with the Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) and serves as the chairperson for the North-West Biokinetics Association of South Africa (BASA) committee. Before Dr Veldsman jointed the North-West University in 2017, she lectured at the University of Venda and worked in private practice as an independent practitioner in private practice.

Prof Nkengafac Villyen Motaze (M.D, M.Sc., PhD) is a Cameroonian medical epidemiologist currently based at Medicine Usage in South Africa (MUSA). In 2007, Villyen completed his medical studies in Yaoundé, Cameroon and worked for four years in the North West province of Cameroon before moving to Cape Town in 2012 where he completed his masters in Clinical Epidemiology at Stellenbosch University.

Professor Lusilda Schutte is an Associate Professor at the Africa Unit for Transdisciplinary Health Research of the North-West University and a registered and practicing Clinical Psychologist.

Building on a Bachelor’s degree with Mathematics, Statistics, and Psychology as majors, Prof Schutte holds a Doctoral degree in Psychology from the North-West University, South Africa, and Master’s degrees in both Clinical Psychology and Statistics.

In 2004, Markus Depfenhart completed his medical studies and received his doctorate from the JWG University in Frankfurt am Main in 2005. He later underwent further studies in other subjects and so he now also holds a LL.M. in economic law and a PhD in business and economics. Among others he developed an algorithm for legal patent circumvention.

I study the relationships between physiochemical properties of drugs, their formulations and the effects on pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics. I work interdisciplinary and integrate chemistry, molecular biology, biochemistry and molecular toxicology in my research. I am actively engaged in various areas of pharmaceutics including biochemical, cellular and whole-animal models, with a focus on infectious diseases and cancer.

Alta (Aletta E.) Schutte is Professor of Physiology, and funded by the Department of Science and Technology as the South African Research Chair (SARChI) in the Early Detection and Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease in South Africa – hosted by the Hypertension in Africa Research Team (HART) at the North-West University. She is also the Unit Director of Medical Research Council Extramural Unit for Hypertension and Cardiovascular Disease.