Long Form

South Africa is rushing to roll out its first national gender-based violence action plan. But as bureaucracy and the coronavirus pandemic stall progress, violence against women continues unabated. And the hot spots that will receive extra resources, it seems, have been wrongly identified.

This is an ode to the women whose names made it into news outlets between 2018 and 2020. It’s also a tribute to those who didn’t – the faceless, nameless women whose stories will remain untold. This project is a collaboration among Bhekisisa, Media Hack and the Canon Collins Trust.

Linda-Gail Bekker says researching infectious diseases such as COVID-19 and HIV is like a colossal round of the murder mystery cluedo. Follow the story of the scientist with the purple pixie-cut from a farm in Zimbabwe to her inauguration as the first African president of the International Aids Society and beyond.

Yvette Raphael describes herself as a ‘professional protester, sjambok feminist and hater of trash’. Government officials would likely refer to her as ‘a rebel’. She’s fought for equality her entire life, she says. And she’s scared of no one.

When it comes to leadership and innovation, there's much that industrialised nations can learn.

The pandemic’s impact is long-term: the UN warns that it could lead to 13 million more child marriages over a decade.

As South Africa enters level two of its national lockdown, international travel remains restricted. One of the few exceptions are repatriation flights, which require a mandatory quarantine period. But the toll of mounting stress and isolation may have long-term consequences on people’s mental health.

From grandmothers to gravediggers, the sudden, suffocating deaths of the coronavirus pandemic is affecting people in all sectors of South African society. Here’s one Cape Town family’s story of life after death. 

In South Africa, two outbreaks are colliding and one thing may shape the future of both.

There are no visiting hours for COVID-19 patients. Instead, there’s anxiety, fear, stigma and potential grief. But there’s also — at least some — resilience.

You can’t visit family members with COVID-19 in hospital. So how do you find out how they’re doing? Mia Malan from the Bhekisisa Centre for Health Journalism documented one woman’s story.

It was hailed as a revolution in private investment in healthcare in Africa but almost a decade after it was opened, Lesotho’s only specialist hospital takes up almost a third of the country’s entire health budget. Now, we may finally know why.

Cases of domestic violence tick up while shelters lose their income and scramble to get ready for the silent, second crisis of gender-based violence that research suggests will follow the coronavirus pandemic.

Tracing the close contacts of people who test positive for coronavirus disease is a delicate dance. Here’s why these health workers wait for the cover of darkness to take action.

Disease-spreading mozzies may be getting wise to our best defences, but science is fighting back.

Botched births and infections can leave many babies with a life-long inheritance: Cerebral palsy. Many will be dependent on caregivers for their entire lives, but could switching up the way we think about treating the condition provide children and carers some respite?