Nicola Willis

Nicola is the Executive Director of Zvandiri. She has spent 20 years living in Africa, initially in Ghana and South Africa, then Zimbabwe since 2004 when she established Zvandiri together with young people living with HIV and a group of volunteers in Harare. Since then, she has led the Zvandiri team in the design, delivery, monitoring, evaluation and scale-up of Zvandiri, ensuring a sustained focus on supporting Government to lead and deliver quality, holistic services for children and adolescents living with HIV. She has maintained a commitment throughout that young people remain at the forefront of everything in Zvandiri and loves nothing more than supporting young people to design and produce their own creative, youth-led innovations.

Nicola is Co-Chair of the World Health Organisation’s Technical Working Group for Adolescent HIV Service Delivery and is a member of WHO’s HIV Guidelines Committee. In 2021, she was awarded a Rainer Arnold Fellowship from Mulago Foundation. In 2022, Zvandiri joined Mulago’s Portfolio.

Nicola studied Paediatric Nursing at Nottingham University followed by Tropical Diseases Nursing at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She holds an MPhil in Public Mental Health from Stellenbosch University.