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Q&A with PATH’s director of HIV and TB program about the launch of a national program in Vietnam to reduce new HIV infections
Two young men in Vietnam read a leaflet about HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and available PrEP services. Photo: PATH.
On November 30, PATH, USAID and Vietnam’s Ministry of Health launched a national program intended to substantially reduce new HIV infections. Global Washington conducted the following Q&A about the new initiative over email with Dr. Kimberly Green, director of PATH’s HIV and TB program.
Why is PATH advocating that pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) be made widely available in Vietnam? What lessons did you learn during this process?
PATH is a trusted partner of the Vietnam Ministry of Health (building of nearly 40 years of work together), and is known and appreciated for facilitating introduction of new, impactful health technologies and approaches. Most recently this included piloting and then scaling HIV lay and self-testing. From 2015, when WHO first included PrEP as part of global HIV prevention guidance, the USAID/PATH Healthy Markets project fostered technical consultations with the MOH to determine if, when and how PrEP would be introduced. With concerns over increasing HIV prevalence among key populations and a growing demand for new HIV prevention options, the MOH agreed that PrEP be included in the HIV 5-year action plan and to pilot PrEP service delivery. Another step that was critically important was working with men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender women (TGW) to better understand demand, willingness to pay and service delivery preferences for PrEP. Once the MOH and the USAID/PATH Healthy Markets project had agreement on the service model, a pilot launched in March 2017. The results were very rapidly positive so the MOH decided to use the preliminary results to add PrEP to national HIV clinical guidelines. This led to greater support within and outside of Vietnam to support the scale-up of PrEP. The recent launch is a result of this cumulative commitment to scaling PrEP and accelerating the reduction of new HIV infections in Vietnam. Read More
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One civilian has been killed every three hours in fighting in Yemen since the beginning of August, with many more people succumbing to disease and hunger, Oxfam said today. The Saudi-led coalition and the internationally-recognized government are battling with the Houthis to control key ports and cities in the country.
Germany has halted arms sales to Saudi Arabia in the wake of the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi embassy in Istanbul, and has called on all EU States to do the same. Oxfam is calling on the US, UK and other governments to suspend arms sales to the Saudis because of their disregard for civilian lives in the war in Yemen.
Yemenis face the triple threat of war, disease and hunger. Between August 1and October 15, 575 civilians were killed in the fighting, including 136 children and 63 women. There have been more than 1.1 million cases of cholera in the last 18 months, with over 2,000 of those proving fatal. And there have been over 100 deaths from diphtheria over a similar period. The UN warned this week that more than 14 million could die from starvation if the war continues.
Read more: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/press/one-civilian-is-dying-every-three-hours-in-yemen-fighting-oxfam/
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