 This is the way to do it. This is the way to do it. This is the way to do it. Wisdom is not limited to age and greatness comes through determination and dedication. At 15 years, Stacey Bosse wears many hats. Let's hear more. Stacey, you wear many titles. Yeah. Tell us a bit about yourself. I'm Stacey Bosse. I am 15 years old. I am an HPV vaccine advocate, an athlete, an intern, a pedicator, and I could also go on. The list goes on. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. So you've spoken about an intern. I assume intern at 15. What does that mean? I am a high school intern at Kisumu Specialist. I basically work at the research lab where I deal with the number of girls who come for HPV vaccines, the number of women who have HPV, what treatment they go through, and also the number of women who have cervical cancer in the hospitals. Yeah. Wow. This is quite a wonder for me myself. Yeah. At such a young age, how did all this begin? How did you get to have this many hats? They didn't all come at once. They just, you know, sometimes you just look down and then you just want to explore. Actually, my path through HPV came back in 2020 when I was supposed to go for my HPV vaccine. So my mom told me, are you going to go for a HPV vaccine? And I was like, what is HPV? And, you know, like she just told me, go find out. And, you know, 2020 was that year when COVID came in and there were a lot of struggles. And just looking at this, I started, like, you know what, I usually run. Why not, why not looking, looking at the number of women who have cervical cancer? I was like, why we can prevent this? Why not start a run and create awareness for girls to get these vaccines? Yeah. Wow. I love the question you've asked, what is HPV? Yeah. And I will throw that to you. What is HPV? A person at 15 years asked you about it, you know, want to know what HPV is. So what is it? Actually, a lot of people don't know what HPV is. So HPV in full is Human Populoma Virus. It is responsible for causing genital warts and other cancers. So it doesn't only cause one cancer, but cervical cancer is the main cancer that it causes. Right now, Kenya is ranked top, top 20 in the, in the number of women suffering from cervical cancer. And just looking at that, and you know, with the women who have cervical cancer now, and looking back, they're in their 50s and their 40s. If you look at that, most of them are old. So try to think of this. These women didn't have as much exposure as we are having right now. So imagine how the numbers will be in future. Wow. And yet it could be prevented. So HPV vaccine comes in as a prevention. Also men can have HPV. Also they can have HPV. As long as you're in sexual contact through kissing, through sex and all that, as long as you're in sexual contact, you can have HPV. Now there's the, Kenya introduced the HPV vaccine in 2019 for girls. And they are currently doing nine, it is 10 to 15. But as long as you're not, as long as you're not promoted to a sexual debut, as long as you've not, as long as you're a virgin, that's actually the right one to use, you can have your HPV vaccine, no matter what age you are. Yeah. And why is it important for young, young ladies and boys like you to understand about HPVs being that you're at that age? Through my advocacy and through the communities I've gone through, the schools I've gone through, I've realized that the government takes the vaccine to schools and you just have to take it because the teachers say they have to take it. But lots of those girls and lots of those girls, actually, the vaccine is not yet there for boys. I'm actually advocating for the boys' vaccines to come in. Lots of the girls who take the vaccines don't know what it is. Now, I usually say it's important for it to come through your heart to go and get the vaccine because currently, 500, 570,000 women die from cervical cancer every year, every year. Now, if you feel pitiful and sympathetic for that amount of women and if you feel like you want to prevent this, actually my disease run was prevention starts with me. So you're preventing yourself from having cervical cancer and you're preventing some other girl from having cervical cancer because you know this is like a sexual contact thing. Yeah. So my mom usually says, go do your research. I believe a lot in doing research. So even when I go to schools, even when I go to the communities and I talk out loud, I usually say, go do your research. Don't only think about what I'm saying, but do your research and just find out and look at this thing as, is this what I want for myself? Is this what I want for my children? Is this what I want for the future generation coming? Yeah. I am inclined to believe that most of the information you acquired about HPV and cervical cancer, you got it from the internship at Kissimmee Specialist Hospital. So how accessible is that information to other young girls and other young boys out there like you? Actually, my internship with Kissimmee Specialist started after I had started the HPV, after I had done both the runs. I actually just started it earlier this year. I'd say that it is there online. You can, I wouldn't say you can ask a teacher because you're not sure whether they know or they don't know. But this is something that is there online. Go to a hospital, ask about it. Actually, HPV vaccines are there for free. I didn't know this before. I was actually advocated for it and I didn't know that it was there for free. So looking at this, go ask in a hospital. Go ask this. You know, people do SRH talks in schools. I actually, right now, with my experience of being a peer educator at Sage, I got to introduce this part of HPV because you can't just go to schools and not give girls the right information. You can't just give them minimize information. So including staff like HPV, including staff like cervical cancer in this can actually help the girls a lot. And not only the girls, it can also help the boys. Speaking about giving facts, there are a lot of misconceptions about human papilloma virus. How do you manage those misconceptions and how does the community take them? A lot of times, a lot of times I've gone into the community and people say, and I talk about HPV and someone says, do I look like I have cervical cancer to you? Do I look like I have that disease? So when they see stuff like that, you try as much as giving them counseling because you see that someone can not just be bitter like that. So sometimes they are taken through therapy and if they still refuse, there's nothing you can do. There's nothing you can do. A girl can't take the HPV vaccine without the parent's consent. So most of the times you find that you'll go to schools and teachers will be like, you can't talk to our girls about sex. You're encouraging them to go and have sex but this is something that is helping them out. So in most cases, I usually just step back and let the government handle it. You go into the communities, you meet elderly people, parents, people your age, how is the reception of the message you're giving out there? Are they receiving it well from what you've told us? Most of the time it's very positive, sometimes when it gets really negative. I'd say before I usually talk to the girls, I talk to all ages actually. You talk to the girls, you talk to the parents, you talk to the teachers and even talk to the religious elders because you know you'll find a case where the parents believe a lot in religion and you'll find the religion elders will be like, you can't give our girls that type of information, it's not right religiously. So in most cases you usually try to give them the facts and try to at least persuade them to get in the information you're giving them but if they don't want it, if they don't want to accept it, then you actually just let them be. I'm intrigued about you're 15 and you're standing to educate other people who are much older than you and also younger than you. Being in that position, how do you feel about it? What challenges and struggles are there for you? There isn't much challenges. Actually sometimes it becomes overwhelming, having a lot of titles. When you're interacting with friends and they'll be like you do too much, you're not your art of league. Most of the time I tend to tell people that outside all these things I'm doing, I'm just a normal person. I talk, I laugh, I cry, just like a normal person. So it's not that overwhelming but looking at my goals and what I want in future, I would say every time one of my biggest motivations is really how I was like three years back. I am not very well known to a like a good family background when I was five. So it's usually like I really want to go back there so I keep on striving towards what I want. Okay. And seeing that you're very young and you're giving out a message to people, why should it matter for them to listen to you at this age? I usually say everyone has their own opinions and everyone has their own, everyone makes their own decision. So you'll go somewhere, talk to someone and tell them that you know that's the right information but if they don't want it there's nothing you can do about it. You can't force someone to, you can't force someone to actually listen to you. So you take the few that come in and you just, you take the few that come in and you use like you give them the right information and you just make them, you make them glow. Okay. So the few that come in the better. I'm interested to know what is the right information coming from you? Most of the time I'd say okay, most people say in the house, even in the hospital where I work in, where you, when you minister to patients, where you talk to different patients, a lot of them will say that you're young, you're young, you're not even a doctor, you shouldn't tell us what to do. So looking back at my research and what I've done and I display what I have learned, I display what I have researched on, what I have seen and if they don't want it then there's no way you can force them. There's no way you can tell someone go take this vaccine because if you can't take this, this and this will happen and if they don't want it then you just leave them. Yeah. And so what can you tell me as a young person who's interested to take the vaccine about it? What should I know about HPV vaccine? I'd say no, the key facts. HPV is not graded a lot. People don't find it to be, to be scary but that kills people. I have seen women suffer from HPV. HPV treatment is very expensive, cervical cancer treatment is very expensive, let alone having those other cancers. It's also very expensive, treating genital warts is expensive. You have this information, go get the vaccine, protect yourself from having this. The vaccine is free. The cost of living with cervical cancer will be very burdening to you. Not only will it it will make the people in the community spicy, it will make your family members not look at you anyway. If you look at how you want to be emotionally unstable because of such a thing that you can prevent, then go for it. Go for it. Most of the time when I'm usually running, people say if you have the space and you have the film, go for it. So go for what you believe in. You mentioned you're a peer educator at SAGE. So what is SAGE and what do you do there? SAGE is supporting girls in education. Basically my part of being a peer educator, I usually go for community health talks. I talk on mental health, I talk on mental health, SRH and sometimes I even do handwork. Yeah, I actually clean around. Apart from that, it's basically just interacting with people and just letting them know, you know, at this far, I also at some point where you are and you can actually be like me if you wanted to. You can be someone. Interacting around multiple health talks at a young age, receiving the negative feedback about the information being a young age. How has it affected maybe your studies? How do you balance it? Okay, so my studies, everything comes very flexibly because I am homeschooled. I actually study from home. So everything is very flexible for me. I studied homeschooling way back in 2021. I, through that, I've done HPV research. I have done my internship. I've done also athletic work. So homeschooling is like a way of balancing everything for me. Yeah, and not making it two of our male living school and everything. It's just, it's like a perfect place for someone who is interacted with so many things. It makes you have your own space and know what you want here. And so how do your parents take all the work that you're doing? How do they receive it? My parents are very supportive of me. My mom has done a huge role. She's the one who actually advised me about HPV and started the run. Actually, she's the one who took a huge role in the first run. And to that I'm thankful. My dad plays, my dad also plays a huge role because once everything becomes overwhelming for me, I'm usually like, I want to quit. I don't want to do all of this stuff. But then my dad is like, you've calmed this far. You've overcome this many stuff. You can still do it. And my dad being the director of SAGE, he's made me recruit other, there are a lot of paid kitters at SAGE. It's made me recruit other people and just meeting people and getting exposed out. And what other channels, maybe I understand you have a community library. Aside from that, what other channels do you use to mentor other young people like you? I have a math club currently running where I have grade six students. Girls specifically. My area of specialty is girls and women. I have a math club for girls. I am actually planning on taking this to the next level where we can start having math competition regionally in Kisumo. So I'm in the process of discussing the schools where we can start having that kind of projects here. And are there any challenges in being in such a position? When it comes to education, I don't, I wouldn't say I have challenges because education is something that it's there in the book. You do it. It's up to you. It's going to be difficult for them now. I find it hard, like back when I was in school, it was kind of, it was hard for me. But then you come to homeschool and you're told you learn at your own pace. So if you don't want to study, you don't study. If you want to study, then you study. So education is something that is on the books. So it's up to you whether you want to understand it or whether you don't want to understand it. You don't have to have someone coming from south, coming from, I don't know where to come and tell you, you can study this and get it. You can actually just see it for yourself and choose whether you want to understand it or you don't want to understand it. So I don't really have a problem when it comes to managing the education systems. So what prompted the decision to get out of school and be homeschooled? So homeschooling came in as what I can say before 2020. Everything was like our financial status really went down. You know, everyone's trying to figure out what is happening and being that I was in a school where the fees was too much and looking back, my mom had a friend who said, you know what, you can actually homeschool where it's much more affordable. It's much more affordable and it's like a better place for what your girl is doing. So I started doing that. So how does it work? Do you have teachers that come teach you at your home? I don't know. In Kenya, it's not really a concept. Many parents will drop their hands around it. Actually, in terms of homeschooling, there are a lot of schools online. The types of ways you can do homeschooling, you can do it through textbooks where you just study through textbooks. You can have a place where you have teachers coming in and tutoring you. That is also homeschooled, considered homeschooling. You can also go to a tutoring center and study there. That is also considered homeschooling, though the tutoring centers don't take as much hours as school does. The tutoring centers, you go and book an hour or a date where you want to study. Yeah. And then you can also study online. Okay. And how would you say, what is the difference between the general or the public way of schooling and homeschooling? What is the difference and how significant has it played a role in you? I wouldn't... Now, where I study homeschooling, I actually study online. Before, I was based at a school where I study, like, Cambridge, where I did the Cambridge system. So before, I used to have teachers online, like Zoom and, yeah, that was when Corona came in and everyone was in Zoom. So, basically, there isn't much difference. The only thing there is that you do it at your own way. You do it when you want to and you do it when you feel comfortable. Actually, in the exams also, you only take your exams when you're actually comfortable enough to take it. And it's just the same thing with school days. Okay, the only thing that's not that is homework. But there's assignments. There's assignments where there's assignments between, like, five to six lessons. There's assignments in between. And when you do the assignment at your own will and you submit it when you feel ready to submit it, you're not forced to go submit this by this time. And how would you say this has helped you improve as a person and as a young person? Homeschooling has made me become responsible. Okay. It has given me, okay, I'd say that homeschooling has given me more pressure than all these other things that I do, because then you have to figure out everything for yourself. You have to figure out what exams you want to do, what system you want to do, how much fees you want to pay, what universities you want to go to and plan everything throughout and sit down and tell yourself, no, I've already had this. Do I want to study? So if you look at all that, all the work you do, then you just become responsible and you're like, this and this time I know I go to class and do this and do this. And when I'm done, I leave and I relax. Yeah. And so what can you, what advice would you give other young people, your peers and even the adults about doing what they feel is right and going for it regardless? I usually say, my mom usually says, you have five minutes space, do your thing. When you feel like you have your thing in your hands and you know what your thing is, then go for it. If you don't know your thing, there's always something that will come out. I have had many chances where I feel like, do I really want to do HPV or do I want to change it to something else? You can always change, you can always mix up. But when you have your thing, go for it and all look back. Wow. You have a brain of a, I don't know, a 35 year old, you know, at such a young age, which is impressive. She has said it clearly. I wouldn't say it best. If you feel you have your thing, go run with it. You have a five minute space. Go with it. This has been Youth In Action. I am Nyangwesa Greenies. See you next time.