Professor Brian Greenwood

Professor Brian Greenwood qualified in medicine at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom in 1962. Following house-officer appointments in London, he spent 3 years in Western Nigeria as a medical registrar and research fellow at University College Hospital, Ibadan. After receiving further training in clinical immunology in the United Kingdom, he returned to Nigeria in 1970, this time to help in establishing a new medical school at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria where he developed his research interests in malaria and meningococcal disease while continuing to teach and practice clinical medicine.

In 1980, he moved to the United Kingdom Medical Research Council Laboratories in The Gambia which he directed for the next 15 years. In The Gambia, he helped to establish a multi-disciplinary research programme which focused on some of the most important infectious diseases prevalent in The Gambia and neighbouring countries such as malaria, pneumonia, measles, meningitis, hepatitis and HIV-2.

In 1996, Professor Greenwood was appointed to the staff of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) where he is now Manson Professor of Clinical Tropical Medicine. While based at the LSHTM, he has continued his research on the control of malaria and meningococcal disease in sub-Saharan Africa, contributing to the studies that demonstrated the impact of the group a meningococcal A meningococcal conjugate vaccine (MenAfriVac) on epidemic meningitis and the impact of seasonal vaccination with RTS,S, the first malaria vaccine to be approved by WHO. More recently he has supported the establishment of a trial site in Kambia district, Sierra Leone, where an Ebola vaccine is being evaluated.

Throughout his career. Professor Greenwood has supported advancement of the careers of African scientists. From 2001–2009, he directed the Gates Malaria Partnership which supported a programme of research and capacity development in many countries in Africa and from 2009–2016 he directed the Malaria Capacity Development Consortium, which supported postgraduate training in malaria research in 5 African universities.