Warner C. Greene, director of the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology (GIVI), is building on his passion for fighting the AIDS crisis in sub-Saharan Africa by accepting the position of president of the Academic Alliance Foundation (AAF). AAF is an organization dedicated to confronting the challenge of HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases in Africa by establishing and supporting programs of care, prevention, and training. A major focus of the foundation is building health care capacity by strengthening academic medical centers in the region. Dr. Greene, who is also co-director of the federally funded UCSF-Gladstone Center for AIDS Research, succeeds the late Dr. Merle Sande, who served as the foundation's first president.
“Warner Greene is a physician-scientist who has devoted his career to the study of HIV,” said Dr. Henry A. McKinnel, former chief executive officer of Pfizer, Inc. and chair of the AAF board of directors. “I can think of no one better qualified to lead the Academic Alliance Foundation as it enters its next phase of urgent and exciting work.”
“The Academic Alliance Foundation is a truly unique organization that has made and is continuing to make innovative responses to the real and present threat posed by HIV/AIDS in Africa,” Dr. Greene said. “Under Dr. Sande's guidance, AAF and the Infectious Diseases Institute (IDI) at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, has trained nearly 2000 African physicians from 26 countries in advanced HIV care thereby helping build health care capacity, is caring for 10,000 HIV-infected patients in its clinic, and is launching new urban programs aimed at HIV prevention that could help curb the raging HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa where 25 million are already infected.”
Dr. Greene, who has been involved with the AAF and IDI for more than 4 years, said the experience has been on of the most rewarding activities of his career. “It has been wonderful helping get the IDI launched, seeing its immediate impact on the care and training fronts, to see the new crop of young African scholars progressing as effective clinical investigators, and to participate in a fantastic collaboration between African and North American and European physician-scientists who share the common goal of curbing the AIDS epidemic in Africa.”
AIDS remains a leading cause of death in Africa and throughout the world. Every day, nearly 7000 people are newly infected with the virus and 5700 die as a result of AIDS. The global challenge of AIDS is huge and the need even larger. Organizations like AAF represent a key component in the world's attempt to turn the tide in sub-Saharan Africa.
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“It is difficult to comprehend the scope and severity of the AIDS epidemic until you witness what is occurring in sub-Saharan Africa first hand,” Dr. Greene said. “If our clinic could support 100,000 patients, it would be immediately fully subscribed with others clamoring at the door.”
He added that IDI is expanding its training and care programs to local clinics located throughout Kampala, so that patients attending these local health centers will benefit from the same level of care as present at the IDI. “If successful, this activity could emerge as a scalable urban model for HIV care and prevention that could transfer to other cities throughout Africa and the developing world.”
In addition to HIV prevention and care, the IDI includes a “Creativity Initiative” that provides a full range of activities for the clinic patients, called “friends”, centered on music, art, and microfinance, which helps remove the stigma associated with HIV infection and empowers people to live more productive lives. As a model for community health services, the IDI has also expanded its training activities to malaria and soon will be adding tuberculosis and reproductive health to its portfolio.
All of this creates many opportunities and challenges for Dr. Greene in his new role.
“Sustainability coupled with judicious expansion of the model is my goal,” he said. That involves maintaining sufficient lines of funding, while planning for expansion to new sites in Africa associated with academic medical centers.
Dr. Greene also hopes to interest other investigators in engaging in scientific work at the IDI. He looks forward to launching his own new research project there, joining several UCSF investigators who have active research programs in Kampala.
“I'm extremely passionate about my work in the AAF and at the IDI,” Dr. Greene said. “I have met so many wonderful people who each share a common goal…to make a difference in Africa by creating the mechanisms for Africans to lead effective programs of HIV care, training, and prevention that benefit other Africans. These efforts are working; it is so rewarding to see the progress in real time.”
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