Kundai Chinyenze, the scientist studying the HIV vaccine: “My mother died of AIDS: I’m doing it for her”

It is a story of redemption, that of Kundai Chinyenze. 44 years old, born and raised in Zimbabwe, is the doctor leading an international team working to create an HIV vaccine. Already 21 years ago, when she was very young, she helped open the first HIV clinic in Zimbabwe.

Her secret dream, as a child, was to become a chemical engineer, but her mother encouraged her to study to be a doctorand cared a lot about his school results.

When she was 15, Kundai finished the year with eleven “A’s”, the highest grade, and she couldn’t wait to let her mother know, who hadn’t been well for some time. She entered the house impatiently, but a relative of hers took her by the hand and accompanied her to the bedroom of the woman, who was lying motionless on her bed. «When I realized he couldn’t recognize me anymore, my heart broke“, remember. Kundai told her anyway that she did great in school, but her mom stared at her with a blank expression. “The pain of not being able to share that joy stayed with me for a long time,” the doctor still recalls today.

Shortly thereafter, the mother’s health deteriorated further: the woman was admitted to the hospital in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe. It was then that Kundai Chinyenze discovered what disease her mother was suffering from, hearing him whisper from a nurse: “That’s the daughter of the woman who has AIDS”. Shocked, she waited to meet the doctor during his evening checkup, and she asked him about it. But he dismissed her quickly: “We don’t talk about these things to children,” and she went away.

Kundai Chinyenze told the Guardian “that I cried, that I looked at my mother’s bed and swore: ‘I will become a doctor and learn all I can about HIV”». She made it, but several years later, and she didn’t have time to save her parents: the mother died immediately after that hospitalization and the father two years later, also of AIDS. Back then, there was no effective treatment: that diagnosis was a sure death sentence.

Chinyenze studied hard and earned a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery at the University of Zimbabwe and, later, also a Master of Public Health at the University of Leeds.

In 2002When he joined the team that opened the first HIV clinic, antiretroviral drugs (which work by stopping the virus from replicating in the body) were not yet available in Zimbabwe. “They were dark days,” he recalls. “It was daunting. There were many deaths and no cure.’ Aids patients were skinny and dehydrated: they lost weight and suffered from chronic diarrhea. That’s when Dr. Chinyenze began researching prevention of HIV, and to work to develop a vaccine. Today he works at immunology laboratoryInternational Aids Vaccine Initiative (Iavi)at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London.

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It is a very difficult job, because the structure of the HIV virus is complicated and the results are never immediate. Three recent studies in Africa and the United States failed, and scientists had to start over. Research currently focuses on neutralizing antibodies, and there is still a long way to go. But Chinyenze has no intention of giving up.

«Seeing my parents die of complications related to AIDS inspired me to become a doctor and specialize in this field. My dream is to develop an HIV vaccine. A vaccine that will be available to my children, my grandchildren and the next generation. That they will not have to approach sex with fearsince it is now seen as a possible death trap.

If, despite the difficulties, he never gave up, it is also for his mother: «My world revolved around her. He was one of my strongest pillars. She was very dynamic, kind and loving. She taught me to believe in myself. And often he told me there was nothing I couldn’t do».

More stories from Vanity Fair that may interest you:

“My Life: A War Against HIV”

HIV virus, Moderna’s experimentation for an mRna vaccine against AIDS is underway

Farewell to Fernando Aiuti, the immunologist who fought AIDS


Source: Vanity Fair

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