Dr Bulemba Katende, MD, MSc, is the MistraL project manager under SolidarMed in Lesotho. His research interests include clinical infectious disease, infectious disease epidemiology and immunology.

For the past ten years, he has worked in various clinical settings as a medical doctor in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Lesotho before moving to a public health setting, where he served as a technical advisor for the districts of Mokhotlong, Butha Buthe and Thaba Tseka in rural Lesotho under the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric Aids Foundation. In this position, in collaboration with the District Health Management Teams (DHMTs), he managed to implement a comprehensive HIV/TB programme, which had a positive impact on HIV and TB case identification, linkage and retention in care.

In 2015, he was awarded the Novartis scholarship, which allowed him to complete a master’s degree in clinical epidemiology at Stellenbosch University in the Republic of South Africa. During this time, he successfully conducted a countrywide research project that explored the impact of the use of GeneXpert technology on patients diagnosed with rifampicin-resistant tuberculosis in Lesotho. Dr Katende has experience in clinical general medicine, medical research, epidemiology and programme management.