Chamu monitors PEPFAR via the Community-Led Monitoring program. He also works on music with a band called Gwevedzi. His involvement in research dates back to 2002, when he joined the University of Zimbabwe-University of California San Francisco Research Collaboration as a community outreach worker. In 2007, working as a counselor in the HPTN 046 nevirapine study, he was reminded of women’s central role in HIV/AIDS, and was compelled to support these women. He joined the Microbicides Trials Network’s VOICE study team to help champion the development of a woman-controlled prevention method. Chamu recorded a song, “For You I Will”, advocating for combination prevention, particularly testing and voluntary medical male circumcision.

Fellowship Focus
Chamu initiated a strong combination prevention advocacy platform. He launched Zimbabwe’s HIV/AIDS Coalition, helped to draft the National Combination HIV Prevention Strategy and participated in the PEPFAR country operating plan, which resulted in an additional $39 million and more meaningful involvement of civil society in the PEPFAR process.

In Their Own Words
I challenged the National AIDS Council on accountability and transparency. The impact is so huge that NAC is now sharing information with the public. However, there is still a lot of advocacy that needs to be done.

Rumbi still works at her host organization, CESHHAR, and remains focused on ensuring that sex workers receive comprehensive health care throughout Zimbabwe. Rumbi did volunteer work in 2011 with TESHE Young Women’s Movement in Zimbabwe and also assisted at TESHE and worked on the film, Odyssey from Student to Sex Worker. Rumbi is a social worker, and her parents are founders of a church; this has guided her advocacy for marginalized populations and HIV.

Fellowship Focus
Rumbi advocated for the scale-up of ARV treatment among sex workers, directly facilitating and supporting their mobilization. She developed a draft of Treatment Guidelines for Sex Workers, promoted sex workers’ voices in different ministries and established circles to ensure that sex workers, civil society, policy makers, service providers and other key stakeholders have conversations that support sex workers to test, seek care and treatment and to optimize the benefits of ART for both prevention and treatment.

In Their Own Words
I learned to study politicians so as to get what you want: spend time going through their speeches to know what words they use and like, read about them and get to know them, make them feel special.