Deevia Bhana is a professor and South African Research Chair in Gender and Childhood Sexuality at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Her research focuses on how gender and sexuality come tomatter in the young life course. Her latest co-edited book is Sex, Sexuality and Sexual Health in Southern Africa (2023, Routledge).

Morten Skovdal is a community health psychologist and professor of participatory health research at the University of Copenhagen. He has a particular interest in involving children and young people in research, both to challenge dominant narratives, and to attune interventions to their lived realities. His latest book is entitled Paradoxes of PrEP for HIV Prevention (2025, Policy Press).

Kaymarlin Govender is a director of research at the HEARD Institute and a research professor in the College of Law and Management Sciences at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He has more than 20 years of experience doing research, interventions and policy analysis with young and vulnerable populations on HIV and sexual and reproductive health and rights in Eastern and Southern Africa. He has more than 130 scientific papers, book chapters and technical reports and has co-edited special issues from leading journals on HIV and sexual health. His most recent co-edited book is Preventing HIV Among Young People in Southern and Eastern Africa: Emerging Evidence and Intervention Strategies (2021, Routledge).