Advocates Archive - N
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Lewis Ndlovu
Cape Town, South Africa
Lewis Ndlovu is a news producer and reporter for Synergy News Media, a non-governmental news porta in Cape Town , South Africal. He is also a key correspondent for an HIV/AIDS health news team in Thailand. As a health reporter and writer Lewis has been to places that are heavily affected by HIV/AIDS, “I never imagined that covering such issues would be a great challenge and a huge learning curve.”
He first encountered IRMA at the 2006 Cape Town conference and recently attended the 2008 conference in New Delhi. On a personal level, Lewis feels that rectal microbicides are an important link to HIV infection for people who engage in unprotected anal sex, including those in relationships.. He hopes that accelerated research and campaign tools are used as sources of information and become readily available as educational tools used to break the “rectal silence." A sense of urgency is necessary in the rectal microbicide world as it needs continued effort and increased funding.
Apart from being a journalist, Lewis is also a fashion model and TV actor. He enjoys traveling and cycling. Lewis also gives free educational sessions to prison inmates on various health topics.
[Posted May 2008]
Obrian Nyamucherera
Harare, Zimbabwe
Obrian is an IRMA advocate from Harare, Zimbabwe where he serves as the national coordinator of Partners Zimbabwe, a partnership of six Zimbabwean HIV/AIDS organizations. These organisations have come together to promote information, dialogue and advocacy on HIV/tuberculosis issues in Zimbabwe, and Obrian coordinates all of their respective activities.
He came to know about IRMA through a friend who is a fellow HIV activist and an admirer of IRMA’s advocacy strategies. She advised Obrian to subscribe to the listserv, and he has been an active member ever since.
In Obrian’s perspective, rectal microbicides are an important priority among new HIV prevention technologies because very little has been done or said about them in Southern Africa - even though they have the potential to save lives. He believes that more research needs to be done on them because of the need for a complete arsenal of tools to fight the transmission of HIV.
“We will never reach a stage where we will sit back and say we have done enough, so we have to broaden the base of HIV prevention technologies!”
Obrian is an advocate to be admired, as he has taken much personal initiative for promoting microbicides in a region of the world where resources are lacking. In Zimbabwe and the surrounding countries, he acknowledges that little information on rectal microbicides is available. As a result, he takes every opportunity he can through workshops, reports, and other means to advocate for more information dissemination regarding microbicides and to push for more feasibility studies
When he is not hard at work advocating for rectal microbicides, he loves to watch soccer and spend time with his family.
[Posted August 2008]
