Centre for Medical Ethics and Law
Staff
The Centre for Medical Ethics & Law is directed by Prof Keymanthri Moodley with secretarial and admin support from Ms Michelle Padiachee
Prof Keymanthri Moodley
Keymanthri Moodley is a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Medicine and Director of the Centre for Medical Ethics and Law, Faculty of Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University. In 2017, she was appointed as Adjunct Professor in the Department of Social Medicine, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, USA. Keymanthri is a specialist family physician, bioethicist and has served as a Principal Investigator on clinical trials. She is an NRF rated researcher and has served on the SAMRC Board, the NHREC and in international organisations: WHO, International AIDS Society (IAS), NIH DSMBs and the WHO SAGE Ebola Working Group. The Centre was re-designated as a Collaborating Centre in Bioethics for the third time in 2023 by the WHO, one of fourteen in the world and the first on the African continent. Keymanthri is a member of the Academy of Science in South Africa (ASSAf) and completed an Executive MBA in 2015. To date, she has been awarded research and capacity development grants to the approximate value of R68 million. The Centre has trained 40 mid-career professionals from 10 African countries in bioethics, has 2 PhD graduates and is currently co-presenting an NIH funded Leadership program in Bioethics with 6 PhD trainees and Keymanthri serves on the Scientific Advisory Committee of EDCTP, Netherlands and the Science and Research Working Group of the International Paralympic Committee, Bonn, Germany.
We have 1 Administrative Officer:Michelle Padiachee
Prof Anton van Niekerk- BTh, DPhil is a professor of philosophy and director of the
Centre for Applied Ethics on the main campus, Stellenbosch University. He is respected both internationally and nationally for his expertise in bioethics. In South Africa, one of his most noteworthy achievements has been the development of the Master's programme in philosophy (applied ethics). Many of his graduates are involved in bioethics teaching throughout South Africa and internationally. Prof van Niekerk has served on the research ethics committees of Stellenbosch University and the Medical Research Council (MRC. He has published widely in the field of bioethics and contributes to the undergraduate teaching of medical ethics in the Faculty of Health Sciences.
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Associate Prof Sharon Kling- MBChB, DCH(SA), FCPaed, MMed, MPhil (Applied Ethics) is an Emeritus Associate professor in the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health and part-time lecturer in addition to project consultant in the Centre for Medical Ethics and Law, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences (FMHS), Stellenbosch University. She serves on the Clinical Ethics Committee at Tygerberg Hospital and the Undergraduate Research Ethics Committee of the FMHS. She is passionate about paediatric ethics and is currently completing her doctorate in applied ethics, in which she critically examines clinical ethics consultation in South Africa.
Prof Daniel Sidler- MD, MPhil (Applied Ethics), FCS (SA) was a consultant paediatric surgeon at the Tygerberg Children's Hospital for over 19 years, after specializing and working as a consultant paediatric surgeon at Red Cross Children's War Memorial Hospital in Cape Town. During this time, he was also a part-time lecturer at the Centre for Medical Ethics and Law, University of Stellenbosch. He has served on the institutional research ethics committee and the Tygerberg Hospital clinical ethics committee. He recently transitioned to private practice in Paediatric Surgery in Cape Town. As a paediatric surgeon, his main interest is neonatal and endoscopic surgery. He maintains a keen interest in ethical issues applying to paediatric surgery.
Ms. Melany Hendricks- Melany is the Principal Clinical Psychologist at Stikland Hospital. She is a senior lecturer and serves on the management committee of the Department of Psychiatry of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University. Melany also serves on the Health Research Ethics Committee and holds an MPhil degree specializing in Bio-Ethics. Melany has an LLB degree and is actively involved in the labour relations management caucus of the Stikland Hospital and in the Presiding/ Investigator Officer forum of the Department of Health. Melany is currently enrolled as a doctoral student in law.
Prof Mariana Kruger- MBChB, MMed Paed, MPhil(Applied Ethics), PhD (Leuven) is the executive head of the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University. She has a special interest in paediatric oncology and ethical aspects of research on children. She is a member of the research ethics committee at Stellenbosch University.
Prof Leslie London- MBChB, MD (Public Health), DOH, M Med (Community Health), BSc Hons (epid) is a Senior Specialist in Public Health at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He is Director of the School of Public Health and Family Medicine and Head of its Health and Human Rights programme. He has served on the South African National Health Research Ethics Council, the Advisory Committee on Human Rights, Ethics and Professional Practice for the Health Professions Council of South Africa and on Boards and Committees of health and human rights non-governmental organisations. His research includes work on the right to health, dual loyalties and human rights, and environmental justice, as well as health hazards related to pesticide exposures in rural communities. He teaches under- and postgraduates in human rights and public health at UCT and other higher education institutions in the country.
Advocate Dianna Pfaff qualified with the degrees BA LLB from the University of Cape Town in 1989 and was admitted as an attorney in 1992. She practiced in the fields of human rights, personal injury, and insurance law, at partnership level from 1995, until joining MacRobert in 1999. Di was a director of MacRobert from 2000 until 2008, jointly heading the Cape Town medical section for some two years, and is now a consultant. Di's areas of expertise include all aspects of medical law, especially those relating to the Health Professions Council of South Africa, inquests, civil litigation and criminal proceedings. She has presented on these topics at conferences and also lectured law graduates in personal injury law for several years.
Prof Brian Warren graduated with an MBChB from the University of Cape Town in 1974. His postgraduate training was at the University of Stellenbosch and he attained the degree MMed (Chir) cum laude in 1985. He was also a Fellow of the College of Surgeons of South Africa and of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. He was a fulltime member of staff of the Department of Surgery, Tygerberg Hospital/University of Stellenbosch since 1985 and has been chairperson of this Department since 2002. With restructuring of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Stellenbosch in 2006, he remained head of the Division of Surgery and was also tasked with the position of executive head of the newly-created Department of Surgical Sciences. Areas of interest are surgery of the gallbladder, biliary tract and pancreas and ethical and medico-legal issues in surgery. He is a founder member of the South African Society of Endoscopic Surgeons (SASES) and served as President of that society from 1997 to 1999.
Prof Ian Vlok is a neurosurgeon by training and holds postgraduate degrees MMed (Neurosurgery) and PhD (Neurosurgery) from the University of Stellenbosch and is a fellow of the College of Neurosurgeons in South Africa (FC Neurosurgery). Prof Vlok also completed an internationally accredited fellowship in spinal surgery in the year 2009 at Groote Schuur Hospital. He is currently the chief specialist at Tygerberg Academic Hospital and holds the academic rank of associate professor at Stellenbosch University. His practice involves all aspects of spinal surgery with a special interest in cervical spine and craniocervical junction pathologies and surgery. He is actively involved in neurosurgical and spinal training both nationally and internationally and currently serves on the executive committees of both the South African Neurosurgical Society as well as the South African Spine Society. He is the current president of the College of Neurosurgeons. He is the current clinical director of the Sunskill post-graduate skills training facility at the University of Stellenbosch.
Dr Chris Verster is a senior lecturer in the Department of Psychiatry at Stellenbosch University, where he also serves on the Health Research Ethics Committee. He holds a joint appointment with the Western Cape Department of Health and Stellenbosch University.
Dr Wandile Ganya is a part-time lecturer at Stellenbosch University, Centre for Medical Ethics and Law. He presently holds an internal medicine registrar post in the Department of Medicine at the University of Cape Town. Dr Ganya is also the 2013 winner of the Medical Protection Society Ethics Essay Competition. He is a fledgling painter and published poet with his first book Divine Interspace published in 2015 and the second, A Dark Wood: Poetical Sketches on Life & Being in the World in 2017. His research interests include African philosophy, discourse analysis in cross-cultural studies, phenomenology, artificial intelligence, bioethics, immunology, and cardiovascular medicine. He has presented academic papers at various national and international conferences thereon.
Research Fellow
Theresa Rossouw is Professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Pretoria. Her research interests encompass a wide spectrum of HIV-related work, spanning from the basic sciences where she predominantly focuses on HIV-associated drug resistance and systemic immune activation, to the clinical and social sciences, where she has been involved in exploring the socio-ethical aspects of HIV/AIDS for more than a decade. Her research and clinical work have culminated in membership of the Southern African Treatment and Resistance Network (SATuRN), the Southern African HIV Clinicians Society’s (SAHIVCS) Guideline Committee, the SAHIVCS Northern Gauteng HIV Resistance Group and an international working group on the Social and Ethical Consequences of HIV Cure Research. She is also a member of the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Health Sciences Research Committee, one of the deputy chairpersons of the Research Ethics Committee of this Faculty and the chairperson of the Research Ethics Committee of the Human Sciences Research Council.
