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Fighting HIV/AIDS in Haiti
Haiti faces the worst HIV/AIDS epidemic
in the Western Hemisphere. Across this
small island nation an estimated 300,000
people—6 percent of the adult population
—live with HIV/AIDS. Last year,
approximately 30,000 Haitians died of the
disease, the leading cause of death among
sexually active adults and young people.
Although Haiti is one of the poorest countries
in the hemisphere, the comprehensive
rural health services it offers in its
central plateau stand as exemplary models
of HIV/AIDS care and treatment for
other low- to middle-income countries
around the world.
For the past several years, many healthcare
workers in Haiti have begun to implement
a number of successful programs to
prevent and treat HIV/AIDS. A Global
Fund grant of US$24 million will support
the expansion of those programs as well
as the implementation of new ones that
will capitalize on the existing skills and
knowledge of the country’s public health
workforce. Prevention activities include:
- Promotion of safe sex through mass communication campaigns that will reach
as many as 1.5 million youth, 4,000 men who have sex with men and 18,000 commercial
sex workers;
- Voluntary counseling and testing services that will reach as many as 300,000
people each year;
- Treatment of 325,000 new cases of sexually transmitted infection, to decrease
the risk of HIV transmission during sexual intercourse; Protection of blood
supplies by providing annually 12,000 new blood bags which have been certified
HIV negative;
- Prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, reaching more than
12,000 HIV-positive pregnant women each year to reduce by half the current
1.5 percent incidence of HIV-positive births; and
- Expansion of a unique antiretroviral therapy program piloted in Haiti
by non-governmental organizations, using community-based, directly observed
treatment to ensure that the appropriate protocols and treatment regimens
are followed for patients who suffer from the common co-infection of HIV and
tuberculosis.
- Care and support for people living with HIV/AIDS will also focus on grassroots
interventions that offer awareness-building among community leaders, support
groups, home visits to families, foster parenting of orphans and vulnerable
children and the distribution of food and monthly hygiene kits.
Haiti consistently demonstrates a high level of political commitment
in the fight against pandemic disease, and First Lady Mildred Trouillot
Aristide chairs her nation’s Country Coordinating Mechanism. Another
member of the team is a journalist, who ensures by his trade that all
activities related to the Global Fund are conducted with complete transparency.
The non-profit branch of Haiti’s largest commercial bank acts as
one of two Principal Recipients that manage Global Fund financing. Under
the guidance of this strong local team, a wide range of actors are implementing
programs supported by the Global Fund. Presently, the government is in
the process of developing nation-wide systems and normative policies to
guide HIV/AIDS programming, while 90 percent of Global Fund financing
backs the work of nongovernmental organizations, faith-based organizations
and the private sector.
As one of four initial countries to receive support from the Global Fund, Haiti
has already accepted as much as US$8 million in grant awards. Since May 2002,
these funds have been channeled directly to non-governmental organizations to:
- Reopen a public health clinic and operating room, stock five public clinics
with essential drugs and provide basic laboratory services to four clinics;
- Expand school-based prevention programs and access to voluntary testing,
counseling and prenatal screening, and increase mother-to-child prevention
coverage by fivefold; and
- Enroll nearly a thousand people living with HIV/AIDS in programs that provide
antiretroviral treatment, with more enrolling every day.
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