Professor Michel D. Kazatchkine has spent the past 25 years fighting AIDS as a leading physician, researcher, administrator, advocate, policy maker, and diplomat.

Dr. Kazatchkine attended medical school at Necker-Enfants-Malades in Paris, studied immunology at the Pasteur Institute, and has completed postdoctoral fellowships at St Mary's hospital in London and Harvard Medical School.

His involvement with HIV began in 1983, when, as a young clinical immunologist, he treated a French couple who had returned from Africa with unexplained fever and severe immune deficiency. By 1985, he had started a clinic in Paris specializing in AIDS, which now treats over 1,600 people. Three years later, he opened the first night clinic for people with HIV in Paris, making it possible for them to obtain confidential health care outside working hours.

Dr. Kazatchkine was Professor of Immunology at Université René Descartes and Head of the Immunology Unit of the Georges Pompidou Hospital in Paris. He has authored or co-authored of over 500 articles in peer reviewed journals, focusing on auto-immunity, immuno-intervention and pathogenesis of HIV/AIDS.

In addition to his clinical teaching and research activities, Dr. Kazatchkine has played key roles in various organizations, including Director of the National Agency for Research on AIDS (ANRS) in France (1998-2005), Chair of the World Health Organization's Strategic and Technical Advisory Committee on HIV/AIDS (2004-2007), member of the WHO's Scientific and Technical Advisory Group on tuberculosis (2004-2007), and French Ambassador on HIV/AIDS and communicable diseases (2005-2007).

Dr. Kazatchkine's involvement with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria began when the organization was initially established. He was the first Chair of the Technical Review Panel of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (2002-2005), and also served as a Board member and Vice-Chair of the Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (2005-2006).

In February, 2007, he was elected Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and took office in Geneva in April, 2007. While recognizing the enormous challenges of tackling HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria globally, Dr. Kazatchkine believes that the progress made in recent years -- particularly through programs supported by the Global Fund -- presents enormous opportunities: "The mission and mandate of the Global Fund developed seven years ago were visionary and aspirational. In 2008, we are closer than ever to making that vision a reality, and the Fund's objective of making a sustainable and significant contribution to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals is actually being accomplished. The unprecedented mobilization for the health of the poor in the past few years is producing results -- results which can be measured in terms of lives saved."

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