Mags Portman

Margaret Denise Portman (27 May 1974 – 6 February 2019) was a British medical doctor who specialised in sexual health. She was an advocate for pre-exposure prophylaxis medication (PrEP) to prevent new HIV cases.

Early life and education Portman was born on 27 May 1974 in Leeds.

Portman completed her MBChB in Glasgow in 1998, qualifying as a general practitioner in 2003. She then received her Certificate of Completion of Training (a UK medical specialist training) in 2014. Portman has been attributed with preventing thousands of new HIV diagnoses through her work ensuring PrEP accessibility.

She appeared prominently in a 2017 BBC documentary, The People vs the NHS: Who Gets the Drugs?, which followed the aftermath of the National Health Service's (NHS) 2016 decision to not fund PrEP. Doctors, including Portman, as well as activists and AIDS charities worked together to lobby for the overturn of the decision.

Personal life Portman had a husband, Martin. Together, they had two children.

Portman was diagnosed with mesothelioma in January 2017. She suspected that her cancer was a result of asbestos exposure from working in a hospital. She died of her illness on 6 February 2019 at the age of 44.

Honors and legacy In October 2018, the Terrence Higgins Trust established the Mags Portman PrEP Access Fund. The Fund's purpose was to provide PrEP to those in England and Northern Ireland who could not afford it. The PrEP Access Fund closed in 2020 as PrEP became available via the NHS.