Making universal social protection a reality for people living with HIV or Tuberculosis

Ensuring that populations who are living with, at risk of or affected by HIV and/or TB can effectively access prevention, diagnosis and treatment services is crucial. Social protection systems have a pivotal role to play in the coverage of both direct medical and non-medical costs, as well as income loss incurred due to the disease. This paper provides examples of institutional practices that improve the inclusiveness of national social protection schemes for people living with HIV and/or TB and the responsiveness of such schemes to their needs.

Cash Plus: An Adolescent Livelihood, Health and Well-being Intervention as part of Tanzania’s Productive Social Safety Net Programme

For adolescent boys and girls, transitioning to adulthood means facing significant social, health and economic risks. These include a lack of economic opportunities, early marriage and pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections including HIV, violence, abuse and exploitation. To support a safe, healthy and productive passage to adulthood, the Tanzania Social Action Fund (TASAF), the Tanzania Commission for AIDS (TACAIDS), UNICEF and other key stakeholders have developed, implemented and evaluated an intervention where social protection and economic empowerment interventions are combined with sexual and reproductive health education and services as part of the Tanzanian government’s cash transfer programme, the Productive Social Safety Net (PSSN).

The resources available include a project brief with a summary of the programme components and impact evaluation, as well as research briefs and reports from the baseline, midline and third wave of data collection.  

 

Achieving More for Girls and Young Women: A Virtual Workshop

Achieving more for Girls and Young Women: Sharing insights and a roadmap for success

This event brought together a community of practitioners to interact and learn with and from each other, and to share insights from cutting-edge programming experiences within the mainline programmes that serve girls’ interests, within and beyond the joint HIV response.

 

Event powerpoints:

Discover - Using Data and Evidence

Define Meeting Needs of Girls and Young Women

Flourish: A Toolbox for Girls and Young Women Leaders on the Frontlines of Gender Justice in Health

A toolbox developed by and for girls and young women leaders pursuing gender justice in health and well-being for girls and young women like ourselves. It includes information and resources that we, as young women and girls, can use to strengthen our advocacy and target our service provision across multiple domains of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) framework, including in HIV prevention and treatment, human rights, and sexual and reproductive health.

HIV Couples Testing in Rwanda

An opportunity to reshape gender norms on sexual and reproductive health in Rwanda: Learning from a pilot project on male partner self-testing for HIV. Rwanda conducted a research study on using self-testing and other means to improve male partner testing and engagement in PMTCT.

Measurement of mother-to-child transmission of HIV in countries with high HIV prevalence in women of reproductive age

This document outlines the fundamentals of PMTCT impact determination and provides considerations for development of pragmatic, streamlined and resource-efficient systems for MTCT estimate generation in high burden settings. The guidance attempts to acknowledge the current reality of PMTCT programme data and the need for reliable MTCT rates while also encouraging a forward-looking approach towards sustainable PMTCT programme data improvements.

Note that this document is intended for countries in sub-Saharan Africa with a high prevalence of HIV among women of reproductive age. Although many of the underlying principles are relevant to settings with a lower burden of HIV, the guidance is not targeted for those programmes.

The tools in appendix 2 can be accessed here.