The South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) has granted a five-year extension to the SAMRC/NWU Extramural Unit (EMU) for Hypertension and Cardiovascular Disease, effective from the beginning of April 2025. This decision follows a successful review process and highlights the crucial role of the unit in addressing the burden of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) in South Africa.

Health research in South Africa has been plunged into crisis with the abrupt termination of several large research grants from the US, with more grant terminations expected in the coming days and weeks. Professor Ntobeko Ntusi, head of the South African Medical Research Council, tells Spotlight about efforts to find alternative funding and to preserve the country’s health research capacity.

Cannabis legislation for private and medicinal use has increased over the past few years globally, including in several African countries for medicinal use as well as farming for profit. Currently, South Africa is the only country in Africa that has legalized the recreational use of cannabis, with the signing into law of the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act by President Ramaphosa on 28th May 2024, which was preceded by an earlier ruling of the Constitutional Court of South Africa in September 2018 which found the criminalization of home use and cultivation of cannabis for personal use by adults unconstitutional.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the new technologies that are modelled to transform global health. Various AI technologies have appealed to political and public interest as this field continues to grow and is already irreversibly transforming health through some radical innovations.

On 18 March 2025, the South African Medical Research Council’s Burden of Disease Research Unit (BODRU) and Mental Health, Alcohol, Substance Use and Tobacco Research Unit (MAST-RU) hosted a briefing on the Alcohol Diagnostic Validation for Injury-Related Trauma (AVIRT) study at the Medicina campus in Cape Town. The study forms part of a collaboration with The George Institute for Global Health UK and the University of Cape Town and took place in the form of a hybrid seminar.