Biography

One of the greatest INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNIZED SCIENTISTS
Emeritus Professor Rose Gana Fomban Leke is Professor of Immunology and Parasitology, Fellow of the Cameroon Academy of Sciences CAS, The African Academy of Science AAS, and The World Academy of Science, TWAS. Until March 2013, Head of Department at the Faculty of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, University of Yaounde 1, and Director of the Biotechnology Centre. Chair of the Board of Directors of the National Medical Research Institute, IMPM, Vice President of the Scientific Committee of Cameroon First Lady’s Research Centre (CIRCB). Invited as the 2014 Aggrey-Fraser-Guggisberg Memorial Lecturer at the University of Ghana and awarded the Doctor Honoris Causa (DSc).
In 2011, one of six women who received the African Union Kwame Nkrumah Scientific Award for Women and received the 2012 award for Excellence in Science from The Cameroon Professional Society. Elected International Honorary Fellow of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene ASTMH in 2015. She is a member of the Canada Gairdner Foundation Global Health Award Advisory Committee.
Elected one of nine women as HEROINE OF HEALTH 2018 and celebrated in Geneva on May 20th, 2018, in the presence of the Director General World Health Organization, the Regional Director WHO/AFRO, and the Cameroon Minister of Health.
On November 23, 2018, she was crowned by the Cameroon Medical Council as QUEEN MOTHER OF THE CAMEROONIAN MEDICAL COMMUNITY
FORBES AFRICA April/May 2021 Edition named her as ICON #24.
December 2022 at the Conference on Public Health in Africa in Kigali, Rwanda, she received a Lifetime achievement award: Achievement in Global Health Leadership, by the AU and Africa CDC
February 2023, appointed Chair of the Independent Review Committee (IRC) of the GAVI Alliance
Received October 14 in Berlin the 2023 Virchow Prize for Global Health
Received the L OREAL UNESCO INTERNATIONAL PRIZE FOR WOMEN IN SCIENCE AFRCA AND ARAB WORLD May 2024
Executive Director of the Cameroon Coalition against malaria, and Chair of the Multilateral Initiative in Malaria (MIM) Secretariat.
She was President of the Federation of African Immunological Societies, a Council member of the International Union of Immunological Societies for two terms.
She has served and still serves as a consultant on many committees for the World Health Organization (WHO): the Malaria Policy Advisory Committee (MPAC), The Malaria Elimination Oversight Committee. She has been Chair of the African Regional Commission for the Certification of the Eradication of Poliomyelitis (ARCC) since 1999, and read the declaration on August 25, 2020, to announce Africa free from the Wild Polio Virus. She is one of the six members of the Global Certification Commission (GCC), the member for the African Region.
She has been a member and Chair of the African Advisory Committee for Health Research (AACHR), a member of the Global ACHR, a Board member of the Global Forum for Health Research, and since 2013 serves on the WHO Emergency Committee for Polio eradication.
She has served as Vice-Chair of first Technical Evaluation Reference group (TERG) of the Global Fund and awarded a Plaque of Honour. She was Chair of the DSMB Azithromycin-chloroquine clinical trial. Also was a member of the Scientific Advisory Group (SAG) for Ebola vaccine trials in Guinea.
Her research interest: Immunology of parasitic infections, particularly Malaria. With a keen interest in Global Health and Health Systems Strengthening. She has been very effective in training the next generation of scientists, MDs, MSc, PhD, national and international, and continues to do so through the HIGHER WOMEN CONSORTIUM CAMEROON, a holistic mentoring program, one of her very successful initiatives. This consortium has had much impact in mentorship of young scientists and researchers and has reached secondary and primary schools.
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education
University
2014
Honorary Degree; Doctor HONORIS CAUSA, University of Ghana, Legon
1975-1979
Ph.D. Microbiology/Immunology, University of Montreal, Canada
1969-1970
M.Sc. Zoology (thesis in molecular parasitology), University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, USA
1966-1969




