Marte Jürgensen won the Researcher Grand Prix finals

Marte Jürgensen with the prize from Researcher Grand Prix. Foto: Torunn Olsnes

Marte Jürgensen presented her research on HIV in Zambia and managed to engage the audience and the judges as she talked about the large number of people who do not want to get tested for HIV, although there are offers of testing at health clinics nearby.

Jürgensen has been studying the reasons for this, and presented a few examples from interviews she has done in her project. The audience learned that more people chose to test themselves when they were offered the test at home. The judges gave top marks for the appearance on stage, the scientific content and the ability to popularize. - You say that you want to save the world, which can be risky, but I believe in you, concluded NRK journalist and judge Linda Eide.

Jürgensen is a medical doctor from NTNU and she now does her PhD at CIH. She is researching how to get more people in Zambia to test themselves for HIV. She has been to Zambia several times to collect research data and she works closely with the University of Zambia.