My father, Costa Gazidis, was a doctor who left apartheid South Africa for the UK in the late 1960s after being imprisoned for his politics – but was able to return in the early 90s to carry out public health work, especially in relation to HIV and Aids.
Costa was born in the mining town of Krugersdorp, the son of Greek immigrant parents, Efthimios Gazidis and Maria Tsolakidis, who ran a tea room. He was an outstanding student at Krugersdorp high school before going to Wits University to study medicine in 1953.
Once qualified he worked at the McCord Zulu hospital in Durban, Baragwaneth hospital in Soweto, Johannesburg, and then at a hospital attached to the mine for black workers in Krugersdorp. By then he had been blacklisted for his political activities and the Krugersdorp job, considered the lowest and worst-paid position a white doctor could take, was the only option open to him.
In 1964 Costa was convicted of being a member of the Communist party – he had attended only two of its meetings before being arrested at the behest of an informant – and spent two and a half years in Pretoria central prison, much of it in solitary confinement.
After being released in 1966 he was subjected to a banning order that severely restricted his freedom of movement and association. By 1968 his life in South Africa had become so untenable that he decided to relocate with his young family to the UK.
In his new home he studied for a diploma in public health before working as an assistant senior medical officer in Portsmouth, as a senior medical officer in Nottingham and then as a senior epidemiologist for the Public Health Laboratory Service in London.
In 1976 he became principal physician (environmental health) at City and Hackney health authority in London before moving in 1982 to take up a post as a specialist in community medicine at Bury health authority. Afterwards he was a consultant in public health medicine for South Birmingham health authority (1986-90) and a sessional medical officer for the West Midlands regional health authority (1990-92) until he returned to South Africa after the fall of apartheid.
Back home he became a public health specialist in Umtata in the Eastern Cape and a senior lecturer at the University of Transkei medical school, before working as a community health specialist in East London from 1996 until retirement in 2004.
Soon after his return to South Africa he had begun prescribing AZT to pregnant mothers with Aids/HIV – until he was threatened with imprisonment by the ANC’s minister of health if he continued to do so on hospital premises. Afterwards he funded the provision of antiretroviral drugs out of his own pocket and formed a charity, the ABBA Trust, to dispense them off hospital premises. Ultimately his efforts, in conjunction with many others, changed the policy of the government to accept and fund antiretrovirals.
Despite his rebellious streak, my father was a happy and optimistic man, a larger-than-life character with a huge sense of humour and charisma. He is survived by his third wife, Janet (nee Page), whom he married in 2005, and by seven children: Amanda, me and his stepson Peter from his first marriage to Dorothea Constantinides, Robert and Shona from his second marriage to Janet Moir, and Rita and Djamilla from two relationships before his marriages – with Ena Arnold and Laura Hitchens respectively.
