UNDP, Global Fund Give Zimbabwe $143 Million HIV/Aids Grant.
In a press release this week, THE United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Global Fund have strengthened their partnership with additional funding of US $143 million to help scale up the fight against HIV in Zimbabwe, and HIV remains a major public health challenge in Zimbabwe with 1.4 million people living with HIV at the end of 2015.
Even though Zimbabwe has seen one of the sharpest declines in HIV prevalence in the region, at 15 percent it remains among the highest HIV prevalence rates in the world.
The HIV grant aims is to increase access to HIV treatment, with a particular focus on the elimination of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, expanding HIV testing and counseling services, and scale up of prevention for adolescents and in and out of school youth, adding that “This timely new funding will sustain and strengthen existing HIV prevention and treatment services in Zimbabwe,” said Bishow Parajuli, UN resident coordinator and UNDP resident representative in Zimbabwe, and “Significant advances have been made in recent years but we must not be complacent,” Parajuli said. “Services must continue if we are to further reduce the rate of new HIV infections while also increasing the number of people initiated on to HIV treatment.”
The press release also said that Implemented by UNDP, in partnership with the Zimbabwean Ministry of Health and Child Care, the National AIDS Council and civil society organizations, the new funding will run from January 2017 through December 2017.
No Comments