By Robert Yule
Today’s session brought together Track 1.o partners to discuss the progress and accomplishments that HIV programmers have made as part of this eight-year long PEPFAR treatment program.
The Track 1.0 treatment mechanism was the largest single treatment program awarded by PEPFAR, and was administered by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Global AIDS Program and the HIV/AIDS Bureau at the Health Resources and Services Administration.
EGPAF’s Dr. Anja Giphart presents on the results of Project HEART.
EGPAF served as a Track 1.0 partner, along with AIDSRelief (Catholic Relief Services Consortium), the Harvard School of Public Health, and the International Center for AIDS Care and Treatment Programs at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.
The session was led by Deborah Birx, Director of the CDC’s Center for Global Health’s Division of Global HIV/AIDS and John Idoko, Director of Nigeria’s National Agency for the Control of AIDS.
Since 2004, under the Track 1.0 mechanism, partners have initiated more than 1.4 million patients on treatment in sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean.
Other accomplishments included contributing to national treatment guidelines, improving diagnostic/laboratory networks to better enroll those found HIV-positive on treatment, strengthening data collection tools and reporting systems (like ICAP’s Unified Reporting System), and building local capacity and transitioning to ensure sustainability of support programs.
Anja Giphart presented on EGPAF’s Project HEART - Help Expand Antiretroviral Therapy to children and families. She discussed how over the past eight years, EGPAF has managed to reach 270,000 HIV-positive women and avert nearly 62,000 pediatric infections in the five Project HEART countries.
Giphart emphasized EGPAF’s work with local partners, and country-specific capacity building. Project HEART trained 7,000 doctors, 11,700 nurses, and 6,900 other health care workers in all 5 countries to support PMTCT and pediatric care and treatment.
She also highlighted our work toward sustainability of programming through transitioning to local NGOs and affiliates in our Project HEART-supported countries.
To learn more about EGPAF’s transition model, click here.
