A medical doctor by training he did his MD from Maulana Azad Medical College, Delhi University and M Sc in Communicable Disease Epidemiology from London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, University of London. Dr Kant was at the Indian Council of Medical Research since 1985, where he headed the Division of Epidemiology & Communicable Diseases for ten years before taking voluntary retirement in April 2011. He also held additional charge of the Divisions of Basic Medical Sciences and International Health while at ICMR.

After retiring from ICMR, he joined the Gates Foundation in May 2011 as Deputy Director, Vaccines & Immunizations, and became Advisor in July 2013.  Here he was responsible for ensuring that the products and interventions were developed and moved through the development pipeline (including regulatory processes) smoothly and were available in a timely manner. He interfaced with some of key health R&D partners in India (public and private sector, academia and research institutes, civil societies and industry) and worked closely with a number of R&D-oriented teams in Seattle. He also served as Sr Adviser-Infectious Diseases at Public Health Foundation of India from Sep 2015 to Jun 2018.

Dr Kant has been a Board Member of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative between 2003 and 2010 as a representative of the Indian Council of Medical Research – one of the founding partners of DNDi. He is serving on the board, since the inception of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative Indian Foundation in 2016.