Women Leading the Charge to End Diseases

By The Global Fund

March 8^th, 2021

In global health, women are often the difference between a community that beats diseases and one that doesn’t. Around the world, the work of the Global Fund partnership is mainly led by women, who challenge existing gender and social norms, empower communities and save lives. On International Women’s Day, we celebrate these women, who continue to fearlessly fight against the world’s three deadliest diseases – HIV, TB and malaria – and are now on the frontlines of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Mulolwa Feza

From a young age, Mulolwa Feza had a deep admiration for doctors. Today, she is a doctor herself. She runs Muungano health center in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo. Most patients who come to Muungano suffer from malaria, but Feza also sees people affected by HIV and TB, as well as victims of violence. The COVID-19 pandemic has had a big impact on Feza’s work: “People are afraid to come to the center because of fear of being diagnosed with COVID-19,” Feza says. “As a result, visitor numbers have significantly dropped.” She now spends a significant part of her time educating her community about the dangers of not seeking medical help, especially for diseases that can be life-threatening.

Amanda Dushime

“We are not a statistic, we are here,” said Amanda Dushime, a young woman living with HIV from Burundi, as she stood next to President Emmanuel Macron of France at the Global Fund’s Sixth Replenishment Conference in Lyon in 2019. She was then 18. Amanda, who was diagnosed with HIV at the age of 11, was speaking on behalf of young people living with HIV around the world: "We demand nothing more than respect for our rights, simply the right to live and hope for a future." Amanda is the ambassador of the “Growing Together” network.

Bazarragchaa

Bazarragchaa is the STREAM Clinical Trial Coordinator at the National Center for Communicable Disease in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. She participated in last year’s tuberculosis country dialogue meeting hosted by the Country Coordinating Mechanism of Mongolia that led to the design of the country’s funding request to the Global Fund.

“We need to shift the paradigm – not to do the same as we have done so for many, many years. We are grassroots. We know what the patients’ needs are and what the clinicians’ needs are.”

"Kiki"

For Kiki, a transgender woman living in Yaoundé, Cameroon, the constant threat of violence and arrest is part of everyday life. Stigma associated with being transgender is another daily challenge. These barriers haven’t held Kiki back from working and advocating for protection of the rights of people in her community. ‘If today, we as transgender community are at this level, it means that tomorrow can be better than this,” Kiki says. Diseases like HIV and COVID-19 are exacerbated by inequities, stigma, discrimination and marginalization as these factors act as barriers to accessing health care. Kiki is working to empower her community and to remove these barriers to health.

The Global Fund / Kemdongmo Djeufo Emmanuel

"Gogo"

Gogo, a traditional healer, activist and outreach worker for HIV and women’s rights, established the South African Positive Women Ambassadors center in two small wooden outbuildings next to her home in KwaGudukazi outside Durban. Well-known in the rural community in which she lives and works, she is also a prominent civil society voice at conferences. “I'm focused on the problem of gender-based violence and work with the community to try and end these harmful practices. Now even men are coming to me with questions about rape.”

Dilma Montero Guallani

Dilma Montero Guallani is a malaria volunteer deep in Bolivia’s Amazon region. Dilma has been trained to provide early diagnosis and treatment for malaria at a community health point. Ninety-eight percent of malaria cases in Bolivia occur in the country’s Amazon region, so Dilma’s work is vital. “Sometimes people even come at night,” she says. “When they come, I need to be ready. I feel good helping my community.” The setting up of these community health points has allowed people like Dilma to become leaders in their communities.

Nombasa Krune-Dumile

Nombasa Krune-Dumile is a front-line health worker living with HIV in Cape Town, South Africa. After beating tuberculosis and COVID-19, she is back in the trenches, helping others overcome all three diseases. “For people who are living with HIV and TB, when COVID-19 arrived, it’s like it was the end of their lives,” Nombasa says. According to Nombasa, COVID-19 has devastated health systems and upended normal operations of her work. She has an urgent appeal to governments and global health partners: “Health workers need training and more PPE to protect themselves and their families from the COVID-19 pandemic. That support is needed now.”