Promoting the Health of Men Who Have Sex with Men Worldwide: a Training Curriculum for Providers

The MSMGF and Johns Hopkins University in 2014 launched a new international training curriculum designed to give healthcare providers the cultural competency and clinical skills necessary to meet the health needs of gay men and other men who have sex with men (MSM). Following the announcement of the World Health Organization’s new Consolidated Guidelines for Key Populations, the curriculum is also intended to serve as a critical vehicle to ensure the reach of WHO’s efforts at the country level.

Consisting of nine modules and covering a wide range of clinically relevant topics, the curriculum’s content was shaped and guided by a group of 15 technical experts, scientists, physicians, psychologists, program implementers and community members from around the world. The introductory modules are designed to help providers gain a broad understanding of the contexts in which MSM navigate their healthcare needs. Subsequent modules offer specific provider-led strategies for increasing access to and quality of services, such as creating an enabling clinical environment, taking an appropriate sexual history, and managing HIV and other STIs among MSM effectively.

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Guidance on Prevention of Viral Hepatitis B & C among People Who Inject Drugs

This guidance on prevention of viral hepatitis B and C among people who inject drugs is the first step in the provision of comprehensive guidance on viral hepatitis surveillance, prevention, and treatment by the World Health Organization. These recommendations are based on systematic reviews of scientific evidence, community values, and preferences and implementation issues.

The focus of this guidance is on low- and middle-income countries, but it applies equally to high-income settings. The WHO, UNODC, UNAIDS technical guide for countries to set targets for universal access to HIV prevention, treatment and care for injecting drug users presents a comprehensive package of interventions for HIV prevention, treatment and care for people who inject drugs. This document has helped to achieve global consensus with high-level political bodies, the United Nations, donor agencies and civil society organizations on adopting a public health response that best addresses HIV in countries facing epidemics of injecting drug use. The nine interventions of this package (see box) are also relevant to the prevention of viral hepatitis, in particular the first two, needle and syringe programmes and opioid substitution therapy.

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Prevention and Treatment of HIV and other Sexually Transmitted Infections for Sex Workers in Low- and Middle-income Countries: Recommendations for a Public Health Approach

Sex workers in many places are highly vulnerable to HIV and other sexually transmitted infections due to multiple factors, including large numbers of sex partners, unsafe working conditions and barriers to the negotiation of consistent condom use. Moreover, sex workers often have little control over these factors because of social marginalization and criminalized work environments. Alcohol, drug use, and violence in some settings may further exacerbate their vulnerability and risk.

The objective of this document is to provide technical recommendations on effective interventions for the prevention and treatment of HIV and other STIs among sex workers and their clients. The guidelines are designed for use by national public health officials and managers of HIV/AIDS and STI programmes, nongovernmental organizations including community and civil society organizations, and health workers. Regions and countries are encouraged to adapt these guidelines to support acceptable services for sex workers taking into account the epidemiological and social context. These guidelines may also be of interest to international funding agencies, the scientific media, health policy-makers and advocates.

Year of publication:

2012

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UNAIDS Guidance for Partnerships with Civil Society, Including People Living with HIV and Key Populations

This document provides guidance on how The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), its Cosponsors and Secretariat (working at national, regional and global levels) should strengthen and operationalize meaningful and respectful partnership work with civil society. It should enable the UN to deliver the targets and elimination commitments agreed in the 2011 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS. It assumes that putting partnerships into practice will take place in the context of Getting to Zero (UNAIDS Strategy 2011–2015) and be supported by the Unified Budget, Results and Accountability Framework (UBRAF)—which is, in essence, the UNAIDS work plan to deliver on Getting to Zero—as well as other key UNAIDS programming and budgeting documents.

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Rapid Assessment Tool for Sexual and Reproductive Health and HIV Linkages

This generic rapid assessment tool, published in 2009 by multiple NGOs and civil society groups, covers a broad range of linkages issues, such as policy, systems, and services. By design, it aims to provide a guide for assessing linkages that can be adapted as needed to regional or national contexts based on a number of factors. Countries are encouraged to review the questions and the scope of the assessment and modify it according to the local situation.This tool can be used as a “standalone” activity or can be integrated into a larger review of the national response. It focuses on questions which can be answered in desk reviews and individual or group interviews (Policy and Systems sections), and individual interviews of various service providers and clients (Service delivery section).

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Getting to Zero: UNAIDS Strategy 2011-2015

Despite widespread commitment to aid effectiveness principles for HIV, true national ownership and downward accountability are still far from assured. Theinterests of the global South, including those of civil society and people living with and affected by HIV, exercise too little influence in the architecture governing the global AIDS response. The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has formed a strategy of transition that aims to see fewer people newly infected than are newly placed on treatment. Doing so will require decisive action guided by a groundbreaking vision: zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination, zero AIDS-related deaths.

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People Living with HIV Global Advocacy Agenda 2013-2015

Published in 2012, this call to action was developed by a group of people living with HIV who are engaged in global advocacy work and who partcipated in a meeting in November 2012 in Marrakech, Morocco to explore how the Global Advocacy Agenda could be used to support and strengthen existing advocacy efforts. The Global Advocacy Agenda is a tool to articulate the advocacy isseus of most significance to the community of people living with HIV, based on broad consultation.

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