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Stephanie Nolen is the Africa correspondent for the Globe and Mail. She has reported from more than 40 countries around the world, including two dozen in Africa. She has a particular mandate to cover the impact of the HIV-AIDS pandemic in Africa.
Ms. Nolen, who is in Toronto covering the AIDS conference, will be on-line at 11 a.m. EDT on Thursday to answer your questions about the key issues at the conference, especially about Africa, the site of the worst AIDS epidemic. You can ask her a question now by using this story's comment function.
This week, she has written about male circumcision, HIV testing and solutions to save newborns. Last year, globeandmail.com produced AIDS in Africa: A turning point which was largely based on Ms. Nolen's work.
Her coverage of AIDS in Africa won the 2003 National Newspaper Award for International Reporting, and she won the award again a year later for reporting on the aftermath of Rwanda's genocide. She was also nominated for the 2004 award for Explanatory Journalism for work on AIDS. She was the recipient of both the 2003 and the 2004 Amnesty International Award for Human Rights Reporting, for reports from war zones in Uganda and Sudan. This year she was nominated a third time for the NNA in foreign reporting.
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She has also reported on issues including the wars in Sudan, the political crisis in Zimbabwe and the peace process in Sierra Leone.
Her book "28: Stories of AIDS in Africa" will be published early next year.
Prior to her posting in Africa, she covered development issues and conflicts, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. She now lives in Johannesburg, where she is making slow progress with lessons in isiZulu, her fifth language.
Editor's Note: globeandmail.com editors will read and allow or reject each question/comment. Comments/questions may be edited for length or clarity. HTML is not allowed. We will not publish questions/comments that include personal attacks on Globe journalists or participants in these discussions, that make false or unsubstantiated allegations, that purport to quote people or reports where the purported quote or fact cannot be easily verified, or questions/comments that include vulgar language or libellous statements. Preference will be given to readers who submit questions/comments using their full name and home town, rather than a pseudonym.
Shane Dingman, globeandmail.com: Hi Stephanie, thanks for joining us to take questions from the readers of globeandmail.com. Several people have written in to express their heartfelt thanks for your work on HIV/AIDS, noting not just your skill as a writer but how reading your stories has changed their lives. Just as many ask the question "Is there any hope?" Coming out of the conference, though it's not over yet, what signs have hope have you seen?
Stephanie Nolen: Thank you, Shane, and my thanks to all the readers who are following our conference coverage. In answer to your first question, the first point, I suppose, is that with 42 million people living with HIV-AIDS around the world, to say that there is no hope is to pretty much write them off, which is absurd. It's certainly true that this conference, which marks 25 years since the first AIDS cases were reported, serves as a sobering reminder that this disease has proved to be, as UNAIDS head Peter Piot was saying yesterday, the worst humanity has ever faced. But every time I attend one of these events I am reminded first of all that there is, all the time, incremental progress - we know more about HIV than we do any other microbe and while we are still a decade away from a vaccine, real progress is being made on a microbicide and some other prevention technologies. We have encouraging new data about the protective effect of circumcision. We know how to keep kids from getting HIV, although the resources aren't yet being marshalled actually to do it. And most important, at a conference like this one sees the vast array of incredibly committed and bright people who are working full tilt on stopping AIDS. Personally, I'm always most struck by the scientists and clinicians and care workers from the developing world who are mounting amazing responses to AIDS with very little support. If they can do what they do, so far from the spotlight, I don't see how we could question whether there is hope.
Janice Cooper from West Kootenays, BC Canada writes: Ms Nolen, in view of the numbers of people, including children, who are impacted by HIV/AIDS in Africa, the depletion of the work force due to illness and death and the famine situation resulting from that lack of labour to plant and harvest sufficient crops, my question is this: Is there hope or despair in the affected population? It seems that it would be extremely difficult to hold on to hope for a better tomorrow, when their present is so difficult, and their future, if they are able to imagine one, would seem to be bleak as well.
