On a dark Durban night in June 2000, two of South Africa’s leading HIV/AIDS researchers were unexpectedly called to a meeting in a plush room at the city’s Hilton Hotel. “The minister wants to see you! Now!” a government official had simply barked at Professors Salim Abdool Karim and Jerry Coovadia, who were both in the process of releasing groundbreaking studies at the International AIDS Conference.

Both men had previously been critical of their government’s response to the epidemic which was at the time killing thousands of their compatriots.