Sir David Nabarro, who was the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) special envoy for Covid-19, and died aged 75 last month (July).
The WHO’s director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was “deeply shocked and saddened by the passing” of Sir David.
London-born Sir David aged just 17, he was the subject of 1967 BBC documentary, The Younger Generation, which followed the lives of five teenagers.
He spent a year volunteering as organiser of Youth Action, leading a group of 400 volunteers in York, between leaving Oundle public school and going to Oxford University to study medicine.
It was this experience which began his life-long interest in social work.
Sir David worked at the United Nations for 17 years, expanding nutrition programmes to underdeveloped countries and tackling health crises including outbreaks of malaria, bird flu and Ebola, before leaving in 2017.
He was appointed as special envoy on Covid-19 for the WHO in 2020 and appeared on news programmes regularly throughout the pandemic, telling Sky News in June 2021 that humanity was going to have to learn how to “co-exist” with Covid-19.
Sir David was knighted at Buckingham Palace in March 2023 for his outstanding contribution to global health.
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