CARICOM/ US ink US$100M PEPFAR agreement

May 12, 2010 News

US Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Karen Williams

CARICOM Deputy Secretary General Ambassador Lolita Applewhaite

US Embassy Georgetown Chargé d’Affaires Karen Williams along with CARICOM Deputy Secretary General Ambassador Lolita Applewhaite yesterday inked an agreement which will see up to US$100M over four years under the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) heading towards this region.
The deal is aimed at giving new hope for the HIV/AIDS community in the region whilst charting a path for sustained support in the fight against the devastating disease. With the signing of the Framework, funds will be available to begin project implementation in June 2010.
The region has the second highest rate of HIV/AIDS prevalence in the world, second only to Sub-Saharan Africa, and the targeted programme for the Caribbean could directly meet critical public health needs and support the outstanding work already ongoing in the region to combat the disease.
This agreement paves the way for Washington to expand the relief program to 12 Caribbean nations.
Previously, only two Caricom member-nations — Guyana and Haiti— and the Dominican Republic had benefited from the program introduced by the George W. Bush administration for African and Caribbean countries worst affected by HIV and AIDS.
Under the agreement, the 12 countries would get 25 million dollars annually or up to 125 million over the next five years.
The new beneficiary nations are Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, The Bahamas, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Suriname. Williams at the signing ceremony said that PEPFAR represents a global commitment first launched in 2003 to reduce the incidence and limit the spread of HIV/AIDS in the world, while assisting those who have contracted the disease.
She pointed out that to date, globally, as a result of PEPFAR, more than two million HIV-infected persons have been treated, more than 10 million have been provided care, and seven million new infections have been prevented.
“PEPFAR represents the largest commitment in history made by a nation to a single disease.”
She explained that PEPFAR employs a diverse prevention, treatment, and care strategy with an emphasis on partnerships, transparency, and accountability for results coordinated from the U.S. Embassy in Barbados.
“Six U.S. government agencies collaborate in a single program in the battle against HIV and AIDS for greatest effectiveness…These agencies are the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the Department of Defence, the Peace Corps, the Health Resources and Services Administration, and the Department of State.
Several meetings and country consultations were conducted with national stakeholders and regional programmes in each of the countries to identify the program priorities that this Partnership Framework embraces.”
Williams also emphasized that the partnership will focus on implementing policies and practices to optimize effectiveness of resources in key areas, including health workforce capacity building, gender equality, protection of human rights, effective HIV counseling and testing, and other areas to be identified as the partnerships develop.
The implementation of the agreement will begin next month when the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States and the Pan Caribbean Partnership against HIV/AIDS (PANCAP) will participate as regional partners.
The countries to benefit, regional organizations and U.S. Embassies in partner countries have together developed the Caribbean Regional Program Partnership Framework, a five-year plan with an anticipated budget of up to $100 million for programmatic cooperation in five areas: prevention, laboratory strengthening, strategic information, capacity building, and sustainability.