Carlos 'Kent' Campbell, a respected public health physician and global health champion who died on February 20, 2024, is being celebrated by colleagues and coworkers for his pivotal role in fight to eliminate malaria in Africa.
"Kent was a true force of nature," said Kammerle Schneider, Chief Global Health Programs Officer at PATH, a nonprofit global health organization based in Seattle , in a remembrance. "Deeply saddened to learn about the passing of a very dear friend and colleague Kent Campbell" , wrote Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, in a post on X/Twitter . "He will be greatly missed, especially in the malaria community."
After beginning his career as a pediatrician with the United States Public Health Service at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), working for four years with the Ministry of Health in El Salvador, he returned to Atlanta to head the CDC's Malaria Branch from 1982 through 1996. He then joined the faculty at the University of Arizona where he worked to establish the College of Public Health and serve d as interim dean.
In 2003, as a consultant to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he spearheaded development of the Malaria Control and Elimination Partnership in Africa (Macepa), which he directed. He later founded and directed the PATH Malaria Center of Excellence.
Under Campbell's leadership, Macepa worked with over 40 African nations to develop and manage malaria control programs that have resulted in substantial reduction in the spread of the disease across the continent. Through Macepa, said Dr. Nanthalile Mugala, PATH Chief of Africa Region, "many proven malaria interventions have been introduced and scaled, saving millions of lives in the continent—in countries like Zambia, Senegal, and Ethiopia."Dr. Elizabeth Chizema, Coordinator of the End Malaria Council in Zambia, credits Campbell with keeping the focus on how malaria can can be defeated. "It's the right people and systems, at the right time and place, that will end this disease," she says .
In 2012, Campbell was named recipient of the distinguished Joseph Augustin LePrince Medal by the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in recognition of outstanding work in the field of malariology.
Kent was born in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1944 and graduated from Haverford College in 1966. He was married that same year to his childhood sweetheart, Eliza Knight. He earned his medical degree from Duke University and did his pediatric residency and earned a Masters in Public Health from Harvard.
For me, the news of Kent's passing is personal.
Before Kent became a trailblazer in the fight to end malaria, inspiring new generations with his optimism and strategic vision, he was my teenage mentor and protector in Knoxville TN, where our parents were close friends and neighbors and active members of Church Street Methodist. Although three years older, he made time to smooth the way for me – in Boy Scout Troop 40 as we hiked the Appalachian Trail and at Young High when I arrived as a small-stature freshman. His counsel was a principal reason I made the life-changing choice to attend Duke University.
Our pathways continued to cross - in Durham, where he and Liz - who was also an important friend of our early days in east Tennessee – lived while Kent attended Duke - and through the decades since, as Tami Hultman and I tracked and reported on his pioneering work at CDC and Macepa. Before our every trip to Africa, as mosquitoes evolved, Kent counseled us on emerging malaria research and how to avoid getting sick!
A recent treasured memory for Tami and me is our stay at Kent and Liz's home in Tucson in 2018, where we caught up on family news and, of course, plotted strategy for how we could help AllAfrica expand its work to elevate knowledge about malaria among policymakers and to tell the stories of the African researchers and community heroes with whom Kent worked.
As we mourn his passing, we take solace in knowing that Kent's impact will live on, as those who stand on his shoulders persevere in the crucial fight to save lives across #Africa and the world.
From the AllAfrica Archive: Global Efforts Paying Off in Malaria Fight (two interviews with Kent Campbell)
