Karen Hofman is Research Professor and founding Director of the SAMRC Centre for Health Economics and Decision Science/ PRICELESS SA at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. A qualified paediatrician, she was on faculty at Johns Hopkins and served as Director of the Policy at the US NIH Fogarty Center. Karen leads multidisciplinary policy research to evaluate interventions both inside the health system and in other sectors that provide the biggest return on investment for health. She is widely published and initiated the research that culminated in Salt regulations and the sugary beverage tax in South Africa. She is an elected member of the South African Academy of Sciences. In 2016 she received the Public Health Assn.  Annual award and in 2020 was the recipient of the Wits Vice Chancellor’s Social Impact Research Award.