Dr Hilary Chung with Noelle Photo: supplied/ Hilary Chung
Dr Hilary Chung is an academic specialising in Asian studies and comparative literature at the University of Auckland, and she is the founding director of the University's popular Global Studies Programme.
Dr Chung also has metastatic breast cancer disease - a disease for which she first received treatment in 2015, and which has since returned and spread through her body.
Dr Chung has thrown herself into efforts to see Pharmac fund the drug Palbociclib - known as Ibrance - a drug that prolongs life but isn't funded.
Like many fellow sufferers, Dr Chung has a Givealittle page to fund her treatment. She talks to Noelle about appearing before the Health Select Committee, keeping fit and fighting cancer, and living with the disease.
