Global and regional report

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.

This document evaluates the Expansion and Scale-Up of HIV-Sensitive Social Protection in Eastern and Southern Africa initiative, implemented by UNICEF in Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe from 2014-2018 with support from the Dutch government. It assesses the extent to which the initiative met its objectives and achieved the expected results and documents the successes, challenges and lessons learned in the implementation.

Under the initiative, UNICEF Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO) and UNICEF Country Offices provided technical assistance to the four priority countries, and documented cross-country learnings. Activities under this initiative differed in their design and execution, allowing for adaptation to country contexts. In Malawi, activities focused on monitoring and evaluation of the National Social Support Policy; designing and implementing a system to refer cash transfer beneficiaries to HIV-related social services; and creating demand for HIV services among adolescents. In Mozambique, activities focused on providing policy-level support to the operationalization of the new social protection strategy, strengthening community-based and statutory case management, and conducting social protection fairs. In Zambia, the Government and UNICEF evaluated and scaled up a package of services that aims to increase the utilization of HIV services by adolescents. In Zimbabwe, the initiative focused on strengthening the child protection case management system and ensuring linkages between the country’s flagship cash transfer programme and HIV-related services, by using payment days to deliver services. In addition, the initiative’s regional component, led by UNICEF ESARO, focused on documentation and dissemination of best practices and overall technical assistance to the country offices involved.

ALL In to #EndAdolescentAIDS

Around the world, an estimated 2.1 million adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19 years were living with HIV in 2016. Some 260,000 older adolescents (aged 15–19 years) were newly infected with HIV in 2016, or nearly  a new infection every two minutes. Nearly three out of four new infections occurred in sub-Saharan Africa. And adolescent girls continue to be disproportionately affected. Globally, nearly two thirds (65 per cent) of new HIV infections among adolescents aged 15–19 years were among girls.

Progress in preventing new infections among adolescents remains unacceptably slow, with new infections declining by only 14 per cent since 2010. Equally concerning, between 2000 and 2015, annual AIDS-related deaths declined for all age groups except adolescents (aged 10–19 years).

Demographic realities further undermine recent hopeful trends. In sub-Saharan Africa, the region most affected by HIV, the youth population has begun to explode in size and will continue to do so, with projections indicating that the number of people younger than 20 will double in 2030. That means redoubled efforts will be necessary to prevent an increase in new HIV infections among adolescents.

UNICEF's 2021 World AIDS Day report provides global and regional statistical updates on children, adolescents and pregnant women. It further provides a brief history of the HIV epidemic and response for children together with a series of human interest stories that shine light on inequalities faced by children and adolescents, especially in HIV treatment and prevention services.

Flip through the 2021 World AIDS Day Spotlight Photo Report, which amplifies the voices of the most marginalized children, adolescents and young mothers along the theme of stolen childhood, lost adolescence. 

Recognizing the persistent and harmful impact that COVID-19 and related lockdown measures pose for the HIV response, governments across ESA region continue to implement interventions to sustain and further advance hard won gains toward ending AIDS. One year after the release of UNICEF's Compendium of innovative approaches to HIV programming in Eastern and Southern Africa in the context of COVID-19, this new Volume II describes results achieved in the nine countries highlighted in Volume I and shares experiences from an additional eight countries. This collective work demonstrates how countries are building upon the learning and architecture of the HIV response to proactively mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic while scaling up efforts to achieve global HIV goals, resulting in stronger responses and resilient systems for both HIV and COVID-19. Many of the adaptations and innovations described have had a positive impact beyond sustaining HIV services during COVID-19 and are demonstrating exciting opportunities to build back better with more flexible and resilient systems.

This flyer provides a quick overview of UNICEF's results within HIV and AIDS in 2020. It describes achievements within UNICEF's main programmatic areas: prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, treatment of children and adolescents living with HIV, and HIV prevention in adolescents. 

UNICEF's Global Annual Results Report - Goal Area 1 describes results achieved in more detail from p. 132-150.
 

Adolescent and young mothers are a priority population for UNICEF in Eastern and Southern Africa, including those who are affected by HIV. In this region, one in four women aged 20-24 years gives birth before the age of 18 years and 30 per cent of all new HIV infections occur among adolescent girls and young women aged 15-24 years. Studies increasingly show poorer maternal, child and HIV outcomes for this age group as compared to older women. Together with governments and partners, UNICEF has been working to promote differentiated, evidence-based approaches to meet the complex needs of adolescent and young mothers in several countries across the region.

This newly released report describes these efforts in nine countries, highlighting the results achieved and the learning. Key insights include the importance of responsive service delivery and social support as well as working across sectors. Also offered are ways in which policy makers, researchers, programme managers and implementers can strengthen HIV and health services for adolescent and young mothers and their children.

This publication primarily seeks to define and clarify the key elements of adolescent-friendly health services to help ensure that adolescents living with HIV receive appropriate and effective treatment, summarize existing guidance on adolescent-friendly health services and differentiated service delivery for adolescents living with HIV while showcasing best-practice case studies based on country experience in implementing these services.

This document is the result of collaborative work between the Department of HIV and Global Hepatitis Programme, WHO and the HIV/AIDS section, UNICEF.

This document outlines evidence-based practices for retention in care of mother-infant pairs in the context of elimination of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (EMTCT) in Eastern and Southern Africa.

Developed by the UNICEF Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO) with support from HIV colleagues and partners, the report provides a review of the evidence-base on improving care for women living with HIV and their infants. It builds on the conceptual framework outlined in UNICEF’s Community-Facility Linkages report through an extensive literature review, stakeholder consultations and country visits.

Ten evidence-based practices were identified in the areas of service quality, human resources, use of health information and demand generation. The report describes these practices, including key considerations for implementation, helpful tools and resources. As countries take these evidence-based practices to scale, even greater numbers of vulnerable women and children will be given the opportunity not only to survive, but also to thrive, and the world will move closer to ending AIDS among children.