Welcome to SASOP

Local Faculty

Opening speaker
	Judge Edwin Cameron Justice Edwin Cameron - is a South African Rhodes scholar and current Constitutional Court justice. He served as a Supreme Court of Appeal judge from 2000 to 2008 and has co-authored a number of books, including Defiant Desire – Gay and Lesbian Lives in South Africa (with Mark Gevisser) and Honoré's South African Law of Trusts. He is the general secretary of the Rhodes Scholarships in Southern Africa and is a patron of the Oxford University Commonwealth Law Journal. He has received many awards and distinctions. These include an Honorary Fellowship of the Society for Advanced Legal Studies, London; the Nelson Mandela Award for Health and Human Rights (2000); Stellenbosch University's Alumnus Award (2000), Transnet's HIV/AIDS Champions Award and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation Excellence in Leadership Award (2003). In 2002 the Bar of England and Wales honoured him with a Special Award for his contribution to international jurisprudence and human rights. In 2008 he served as a member of the Jury of the Red Ribbon Award, a partnership of the UNAIDS Family.

Archaeology and Anthropology
	Prof Lyn Wadley Prof Lyn Wadley - is a Honorary Professor in the Department Archaeology, School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies and Institute for Human Evolution at the University of the Witwatersrand. She has extensive excavation experience, as principal investigator, at the following sites: Duncombe Cave (Zimbabwe); Big Elephant Shelter (Namibia); Jubilee Shelter, Fort Troje, Cave James, Cave Elizabeth, Hope Hill Shelter, Horos Cave, Leslie Falls Cave, Kloofendal Shelter (Gauteng); Queens Hill, Rose Cottage Cave Roosfontein, Mauermanshoek, Twyfelpoort (Free State) and Sibudu Cave in KwaZulu-Natal. She is an A-rated NFR researcher and member of several professional associations, including: Southern African Association of Archaeologists (Chairperson 1999-2000); South African Archaeological Society; (President 2005-2006); Society for Africanist Archaeologists; and Editorial Board of South African Archaeological Bulletin. She received several awards including: the CSD award of Larger Research Project (1990 1992/1992-1999); Wits award of Programme status to research project (1989 1991/1992-1999); and NFR Specific Area Awards for 2000-2006. Published books include: Hunters and gatherers of the Later Stone Age, southern Transvaal (1987); (edited) Our Gendered Past: Archaeological studies of gender in South Africa (1997); and (edited with Whitelaw) Sibudu Cave: background to the excavations, stratigraphy and dating (2006).

	Prof. David Lewis-Williams Prof David Lewis-Williams - is Professor Emeritus and appointed Senior Mentor at the Rock Art Research Institute, School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies, at the University of the Witwatersrand. He is an esteemed expert on rock art and psychological evolution and has been a NFR A-rated researcher for subsequent years. Apart from being the translator of the new South African national motto into the /Xam San language, he received numerous honours and awards, including: the James Henry Breasted Prize by the American Historical Association; the award for Excellence in Archaeological Analysis by the Society for American Archaeology; a Honorary D.Litt. by the University of Cape Town and a Honorary D.Sc. by University of the Witwatersrand; elected visiting overseas Research Fellow by St John's College, Cambridge; and elected to Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Anthropological Institute, United Kingdom. Titles of his numerous books include: (with David Pearce) San Spirituality: roots, expressions and social consequences (2004); (with D. Pearce) Inside the Neolithic mind: consciousness, cosmos and the realm of the gods(2005); Conceiving God: the cognitive origin and evolution of religion (2010) and (with Sam Challis) Deciphering ancient minds: the mystery of San Bushman rock art (2011).

	Dr Kristian Carlson Dr Kristian Carlson is a senior researcher with the Institute for Human Evolution, University of the Witwatersrand. He was part of the team headed by Prof Lee Berger who discovered and described a new species of early human ancestor,Australopithecus sediba, at the Malapa site in 2008. Dr Carlson participated in excavations and recovery of specimens at Malapa. He also is a team member participating in the description and interpretation of hominin postcranial remains. He is responsible for directing all aspects of the Malapa hominin research specifically related to visualization and virtual-based analyses, including the use of 3D data acquisition modalities such as CT scanning and synchrotron. Dr Carlson received his undergraduate BS degrees in Anthropology and Anthropology-Zoology from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and completed a MA and PhD degrees in Anthropology from Indiana University, Bloomington. He undertook postdoctoral research in the Department of Anatomical Sciences, Stony Brook University and in the Anthropologisches Institut und Museum, Universität Zürich, Switzerland.

Ecologist and conservationist
	Dr Ian McCallum Dr. Ian McCullam is a psychiatrist, Jungian analyst and Director of the Wilderness Foundation, Africa. He is the author of the novel Thorns to Kilimanjaro and a poetry collection Wild Gifts. He is a well-known conservationist, explorer and expert wilderness guide, whose highly acclaimed book Ecological Intelligence - Rediscovering ourselves in Nature, suggests a new way of looking at evolutionary bonds as a key to our ecological survival. His other interests include photography (Agfa Wildlife category winner 2001) and sport (he is a former rugby Springbok, 1970-74). He is also a trustee of the Cape Leopard Trust and has travelled extensively in South Africa, Zambia, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.

HIV/AIDS and reproductive health expert
	Prof Helen Rees Prof Helen Rees - is the Executive Director of the Wits Reproductive Health and HIV Institute (WRHI) of the University of the Witwatersrand, where she is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Professor Rees received her Medical Degree and her Masters in Social and Political Sciences from Cambridge University and in 2002 became an alumni of Harvard Business School. Recently, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine awarded her the prestigious 2010 Heath Clarke Lectureship and appointed her as an Honorary Professor in 2009.She has been appointed to numerous national and international committees and scientific bodies. Currently she serves on the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization which advises the Director General of WHO on matters relating to global immunization policy and guidelines. She is a member of the Board of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) and served as the Chairperson of the IAVI International Clinical Trials Committee. She was a member of the Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise Committee, which is a joint initiative between the Gates Foundation, NIH, WHO and UNAIDS. She served on the international Scientific Advisory committees for the US National Institute of Health's (NIH) global networks for HIV Vaccine development and serves on both the NIH and the Population Council's Advisory Committees for Microbicide development. She is a member of the WHO/UNAIDS VAC committee on HIV vaccines, and of the WHO Expert Committee on HPV Vaccines. She has chaired the WHO Advisory Committees on Clinical trials and regulation of HIV vaccines, and on HPV vaccines in developing countries. She regularly serves as an adviser to the World Health Organization and to UNAIDS in other areas of HIV prevention and reproductive health including HIV Pre-exposure prophylaxis, microbicides, contraception and sexually transmitted diseases.

Health Economist
	Prof Di McIntyre Prof Di McIntyre is the South African Research Chair in 'Health and Wealth' and a Professor in the School of Public Health and Family Medicine at the University of Cape Town, where she has worked since 1988. She founded the Health Economics Unit (HEU) in 1990 and was its Director for 13 years. She has completed Bachelor of Commerce, Honors and Masters' degrees in Economics at the University of Cape Town. She has also completed a PhD by dissertation, entitled “Health care financing and expenditure in South Africa: Towards equity and efficiency in policy making”. In addition to general technical support activities in South Africa and other African countries, she has served on a number of policy committees. These include serving on the Health Care Finance Advisory Committee to the Department of Health of the Government of National Unity, the Minister of Health's Committee of Inquiry into a National Health Insurance for South Africa and the Medical Schemes Council. She also chaired the Minister of Health's Medicine Pricing Committee from its establishment in 2003 until 2008. She currently serves on the Ministerial Advisory Committee on National Health Insurance.

Public and Private Sector
	Dr Jonathan Broomberg Dr Jonathan Broomberg studied medicine at the University of the Witwatersrand, then read Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford while on a Rhodes Scholarship. He subsequently completed MSc and PHD degrees in Health Economics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University of London. He is the CEO of Discovery Health and serves on the Group Executive Committee. Discovery is South Africa's largest health insurer, with additional operations in the United Kingdom and the United States, and is globally recognised as an innovator in the integration of health insurance with incentive programmes to encourage wellness, prevention and health seeking behaviour, through its Vitality programme. More recently, he was appointed by the South African Government's Ministerial Task Team on Social Health Insurance to lead an investigation into the establishment of low income health insurance arrangements for South Africa. Until 2007, he was a member of the Technical Review Panel of the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, and served as Chair of the TRP for two funding rounds. He is a director of the Soul City Institute for Health Communications.

	Dr. Yogan Pillay Dr. Pillay is the Deputy Director-General responsible for the following health programmes: HIV & AIDS, TB and MCWH. In addition, he is currently overseeing the strengthening of the district health system as well as communicable diseases, non-communicable diseases and nutrition programmes. He has a doctorate in public health from Johns Hopkins University and has recently co-authored the 'Textbook of International Health: global health in a dynamic world (with Drs Anne-Emanuelle Birn and Tim Holtz).

	Dr Carol Marshall Dr Marshall Director of the Office of Standards compliance, Department of Health Pretoria

Psychiatry and Mental Health
	Dr Lynda Albertyn Principal Specialist and Head, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital and the University of the Witwatersrand. She obtained a BA (Eng and Hist. Art), (Wits), BM (Soton), MMed Psych (UZ), FCPsych (SA). Her special interests are autism spectrum disorders (she was an advisor to Unica School for autism 2004-2011), development of subspecialization of child and adolescent psychiatry, ADHD and medical education.

	Prof Jonathan Burns Associate Professor and Head, Dept of Psychiatry, University of KwaZulu-Natal. He trained in medicine and psychiatry at the University of Cape Town, worked as a Research Fellow in the Department of Psychiatry. His interests include psychiatric epidemiology, social determinants of mental disorders, and mental health systems research. He has authored and co-authored several peer-reviewed articles, including on: the impact of psychosocial and cultural factors on the clinical presentation of firstepisode psychosis; income inequality and the treated incidence of first-episode psychosis in South Africa; and on reform in the use of coercion in psychiatry. He is author of the book The Descent of Madness: Evolutionary Origins of Psychosis and the Social Brain (2007) and co-author of the Oxford Handbook of Psychiatry (2005).

	Prof Robin Emsley Professor in Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, University of Stellenbosch. He obtained his medical degree at the University of Cape Town in 1974, and his psychiatry degree with distinctions at the University of Stellenbosch in 1981. He was awarded a Doctorate in Medicine in 1987, for studies on the neuro-endocrinology of schizophrenia and alcohol dependence and obtained the degree Doctor of Science in 2007 for studies in the psychopathology, neurobiology and psychopharmacology of schizophrenia. He serves on national and international professional and scientific committees and advisory boards, and is the recipient of national and international research grants and awards. He is on the editorial board of several international journals, including Schizophrenia Research, Early Intervention in Psychiatry, Psychiatry 2009, Schizophrenia Research and Treatment, the Open Psychiatry Journal, the Open Clinical Trials Journal, the Open Neuropsychopharmacology Journal, Mind & Brain - The Journal of Psychiatry, the African Journal of Psychiatry and is the past editor of the South African Journal of Psychiatry. He has published 239 scientific publications (articles, letters, chapters, books). His main area of interest is in the psychopharmacology of schizophrenia and his group has published extensively in this field.

	Prof Crick Lund Associate Professor in the Centre for Public Mental Health, Department of Psychiatry and Mental, Health, University of Cape Town. He obtained a BA (Hons), MA, MSocSci (Clinical Psychology) and PhD at the University of Cape Town. He is currently Director of the Mental Health and Poverty Project, a study on mental health policy development and implementation in Ghana, South Africa, Uganda and Zambia. He previously worked for the World Health Organisation (WHO), on the development of the WHO Mental Health Policy and Service Guidance Package, and consulted to Lesotho, Namibia and Indonesia on mental health policy and planning. His research interests lie in mental health policy, service planning and the relationship between poverty and mental health.

	Prof Solomon Tshimong Rataemane Professor, Head of Department of Psychiatry, University of Limpopo. Chair SASOP Division of Relations, WPA Board member and WPA Representative Zone 14, Southern and Eastern Africa, and Chair of the WPA Section on Conflict Management and Conflict Resolution. He has special interest in child psychiatry, mood disorders and addiction medicine and has served as deputy chairperson and chairperson of the Central Drug Authority of South Africa from 1995 to 2005. He is currently involved with UCLA Substance Abuse Program in collaborative research to improve Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for counsellors at SANCA Clinics in South Africa. He is a Board member of ICAA (International Council on Alcohol and Addictions) and served on the Health and Examinations Committees and the Medical and Dental Board of the Health Professions Council of South Africa until May 2010. His current engagements include an effort to develop policy and protocols for management of substance abuse. He was appointed Deputy Chair of the Medical Research Council of South Africa for the triennium 2007 to 2010, and also serves a third term as member, previous terms as senator, of the Colleges of Psychiatry. His other membership of organizations include: World Association for Social Psychiatry; Mentor Foundation for assisting youth with alcohol & drug addiction; and the American Psychiatric Association.

	Prof Soraya Seedat Executive Head of Department of Psychiatry, University of Stellenbosch. She holds the South African Research Chair in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder from the Department of Science and Technology and National Research Foundation. In addition, she co-directs the Medical Research Council Unit on Anxiety and Stress Disorders. She has been the recipient of several awards including a World Federation of the Society of Biological Psychiatry Fellowship, a Lundbeck Institute Fellowship Award in Psychiatry, an MRC mid-career award, and an Anxiety Disorders Association of America Career Development Award. She has co-authored more than 170 peer reviewed journal articles and book chapters and has extensive research experience in the assessment and treatment of anxiety disorders, with a special interest in clinical and translational work in childhood and adult posttraumatic stress disorder.

	Prof Dan J Stein Professor and Chair of the Dept of Psychiatry and Mental Health, University of Cape Town. He is also Director of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Unit on Anxiety Disorders, and Visiting Professor of Psychiatry at Mt. Sinai Medical School in New York. His research focuses on the psychobiology and management of the anxiety disorders, including obsessive-compulsive disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, and social anxiety disorder. He did his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Cape Town, and his doctorate (in the area of clinical neuroscience) at the University of Stellenbosch. He trained in psychiatry, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship (in the area of psychopharmacology) at Columbia University in New York. His training also includes a doctorate in philosophy. His research ranges from basic neuroscience all the way through to epidemiological and cross-cultural research. He is particularly enthusiastic about the possibility of clinical practice and scientific research that integrates theoretical concepts and empirical data across these different levels. He has authored or edited over 25 volumes, including Cognitive-Affective Neuroscience of Mood and Anxiety Disorders, and “The Philosophy of Psychopharmacology: Smart Pills, Happy Pills, Pep Pills”. His work has been continuously funded by extramural grants for more than 15 years. He is a recipient of CINP's Max Hamilton Memorial Award for his contribution to psychopharmacology, and of CINP's Ethics and Psychopharmacology Award for his contribution to the philosophy of psychopharmacology.

	Prof Christopher P Szabo Professor, Head of Division of Psychiatry, University of the Witwatersrand and President of the College of Psychiatry, South African Colleges of Medicine. He is also the current President of the College of Psychiatry of the South African Colleges of Medicine and editor-in-chief of the African Journal of Psychiatry. He is a member of several professional bodies including the Academy for Eating Disorders (USA) and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) since August 2009. He obtained his M Med (Psychiatry) from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa in 1992 and a PhD in 2002 in the area of eating disorders with the title" A cross-cultural study of eating attitudes in adolescent, South African females: possible implications for the epidemiology of eating disorders in South Africa". He completed a MSc (Med) in Bioethics and Health Law through the Division of Bioethics, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand in 2005. His fields of expertise include eating disorders, and medical/psychiatric education and publishing.

	Prof Werdie C.W van Staden Professor of Philosophy and Psychiatry, Head: Division of Philosophy and Ethics of Mental Health, University of Pretoria.He directs an MPhil-degree programme and supervises doctoral research in this field. Following his training as physician and specialisation in psychiatry at the University of Pretoria, he continued his clinical training and his study in philosophy in the United Kingdom where the University of Warwick awarded him a doctorate of medicine in philosophy. He also holds qualifications in music at master's degree level from the University of London (UK) and the University of South Africa. He published several papers and chapters in medical and philosophy journals and books. His core interests are in values in health, incapacity, the philosophy of Gottlob Frege, and the symptomatology of schizophrenia. He considers his most profound philosophical work, captured in the journal Philosophy, Psychiatry & Psychology under the title Linguistic markers of recovery: theoretical underpinnings of first person pronoun usage and semantic positions of patients. He is the editor of the South African Journal of Psychiatry, serves on the editorial boards of a number of international journals, including Philosophy, Psychiatry & Psychology and is managing editor of Philosophy, Ethics & Humanities in Medicine. He serves on the Steering Committee of the International Network for Philosophy & Psychiatry consisting of more than 40 national associations.

	Professor Merryll Vorster Professor and Vice-Dean: Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand. She obtained a MBBCH (Wits), MMed Psychiatry (Wits), BA (UNISA), PhD Medicine (Wits), Certificate in Medicine and Law (UNISA) and Diploma in International Research Ethics (UCT). Her fields of interests and expertise are forensic psychiatry and bioethics. She is a past-previous Academic Head of the Division of Psychiatry and Head of the School of Clinical Medicine of the Wits Faculty of Health Sciences, as well as a past-president of the SASOP. As vice-dean she served on the boards of: the WITS Adler Museum of Medicine (as chair); the Steve Biko Centre for Bioethics; and the Advisory Board of the Centre for Rural Health. She is a deputy-chair of the WITS Human Research Ethics Committee (Medical) and Honorary Lecturer at the Steve Biko Centre for Bioethics.