Rebecca Mbewe

Rebecca is a mentor, speaker, trainer and researcher. She has longstanding experience of working within the HIV sector working in community engagement around living with HIV and Pregnancy, Ageing with HIV and other issues including Stigma and how it affects people living with HIV.

Her expertise and passion is underpinned by her own very personal experience of living with an HIV diagnosis for over 20 years. It was her drive to delve into HIV work through which she has been involved in many projects and campaigns. Rebecca is an avid believer is self development and has gone on to attain a BSc in Psychology and an MBA in Healthcare despite challenges along the way.

Rebecca wears many hats including being a co-director for 4M Mentor Mothers Network CIC (4mmm.org), an organisation led by 3 Black African women, which offers mentoring, support and training for women living with HIV going through the perinatal journey. She has recently joined Queen Mary University as a research assistant and is also an associate of the Salamander Trust, which aims to protect, promote and enhance the health and rights of people marginalised by societies worldwide as a result of their gender, HIV status or sexual and reproductive health issues, some of the issues Rebecca is passionate about.

Rebecca has built a network of very close friends and allies, out which the writing group and idea for this book was borne. Her hopes for the book are that people will be inspired to live well with their diagnosis should they find themselves in a similar situation but also that HIV can continue to be on the agenda so that people are not afraid to get tested and consequently become part of the wider agenda to drive new HIV infection rates to zero by 2030.