TWAS President Quarraisha Abdool Karim and Zulfiqar A. Bhutta, a 2016 TWAS awardee, have been jointly awarded the Virchow Prize 2025, in recognition of their pioneering, lifelong leadership in advancing maternal, newborn, and child health equity through community-centred, evidence-based research, in particular supporting some of the world’s most vulnerable people.
The announcement which is following the decision of the independent Virchow Prize Committee, chaired by Professor Dr. Ole Petter Ottersen, former President of Karolinska Institutet, was made today at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW) by Virchow Foundation’s Co-Founders Professor Dr. Christoph Markschies, Professor Dr. Detlev Ganten and Roland Göhde.
Read a joint statement on the prize from Abdool Karim and Bhutta.
The Virchow Prize 2025 laureates have shaped health policies and practice by closing critical gaps in care for vulnerable populations. Their leadership has ensured that life-saving services reach those in low-resource and crisis-affected settings, where health systems are often weakest and disparities most acute.
Abdool Karim, a clinical epidemiologist affiliated with CAPRISA in South Africa and Columbia University in the United States, is internationally recognised for her leadership in HIV prevention among girls and young women, with far-reaching implications for maternal and adolescent health. Her leadership of the CAPRISA 004 trial provided the first proof that antiretroviral drugs could prevent HIV infection in women, a finding that has had a lasting impact on global HIV prevention efforts. She has also played a key role in building scientific capacity across Africa, mentoring a generation of women scientists.
Bhutta, a paediatrician and public health scientist based at Aga Khan University in Pakistan and the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, has led major studies on maternal, newborn, and child health, nutrition, and primary care. His research has informed World Health Organization guidelines and national health policies in South Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and humanitarian settings. A long-time advocate for locally-led solutions, Bhutta has championed community health worker programs and nutrition interventions during the critical first 1,000 days of life.
"Though their paths are distinct, both laureates have helped redefine the global health architecture by focusing on those historically excluded from mainstream health systems and scientific discourse," said Professor Markschies, serving as President of both the Virchow Foundation and the BBAW. "Both laureates epitomise Virchow’s tradition of integrating scientific rigour with social consciousness; advancing practices in global health that are empirically grounded, equity-driven, and politically transformative."
The Virchow Prize 2025 award ceremony will take place on 11 October at Rotes Rathaus, Berlin City Hall. The laureates will be honoured in the presence of the Governing Mayor of Berlin and High Patron of the Virchow Foundation, Kai Wegner, alongside 300 high-ranking international guests and leaders from civil society, science, business, politics and the global health community.
About the Virchow Prize and the Virchow Foundation
With its annual awarding of the Virchow Prize, the non-profit Virchow Foundation highlights and supports the efforts of the United Nations to preserve the health of people and the planet by setting a leading example of underscoring health as most important entry point to the UN 2030 Agenda Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), emphasizing the health-related interdependencies of all 17 SDGs. The Virchow Prize, endowed with €500,000, honours individuals and organisations for their outstanding innovations, contributions and lifetime achievements in improving global health on the path to ‘health for all’. The Virchow Foundation was established in 2021 on the occasion of the 200th birthday of its namesake Rudolf Virchow, with support of the Presidents of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina and the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities as well as Members of the German Bundestag and civil society, aiming to contribute to the improvement of health worldwide.
More information: www.virchowprize.org
For further information, please contact:
Rebecca Ohanes
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