E8 Sec. Board Member, E8 Technical Committee Member, Director South African Medical Research Centre (MRC)
Prof Rajendra Maharaj holds a PhD in Entomology from the University of KwaZulu Natal as well as a second Masters in Infectious Diseases from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. His research interests focus on public health, malaria control and infectious disease control.
Prof Maharaj has over 30 years of experience in malaria research and control and his main areas of research is innovative technologies for the control of malaria vectors, especially pertaining to large-scale vector control.
He is currently the Director of the Office of Malaria Research at the South African Medical Research Council and serves on various national and international Boards such as the South African Malaria Elimination Board and the World Health Organisation Vector Control Working Group on indoor residual spraying. He is also on the Board of Lubombo Spatial Development Initiative 2 having oversight of the implementation of the trinational MOSASWA programme.
Prof Maharaj has attended and participated in national, regional and international conferences. Annually, since 2015, he hosts the “Annual Southern African Malaria Conference”. His work has been disseminated through the publication of almost 100 scholarly articles and publication in peer-reviewed manuscripts.
Prof Maharaj hols an associate professorship at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and an extraordinary professorship at the University of Pretoria. In this capacity he has supervised and co-supervised doctoral, masters and honours students at the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal and the University of Pretoria.