AFEW International represented by Daria Alekseeva, Program Director and Yuri de Boer, Senior Program Manager, and Ainura Batyrbekova, Project Manager of AFEW Kazakhstan concluded a scoping mission to Tashkent from 15-17 January.
At the invitation of the Ministry of Health and with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan, the team met with the Republican AIDS Center and the Municipal AIDS Center of the City of Tashkent, the Country Coordinating Mechanism (CCM) on HIV/AIDS, international organizations, as well as a broad range of community based organisations, including networks of people living with HIV.
At the center of the discussion are several proposed interventions to further develop and improve the quality of HIV testing and prevention services for key populations and support to people living with HIV. The overall aims of the proposed projects is to strength the role of civil society and key populations in inclusive health care in Uzbekistan, in particularly in motivating the most difficult to reach groups to get an HIV testing, and to further strengthen the capacity of AIDS Centers and service providers. During the meetings, all parties involved acknowledged the need to keep focus particularly on key populations (people who use drugs, men who have sex with men, transgender people, and sex workers) and use the expertise of the AIDS Centers as well as the community organizations to better access these groups. Optimized ART adherence for people on treatment was also seen as a possible outcome of joint interventions.
In the coming months, project proposals will be further developed, and formal endorsement from governmental stakeholders and the CCM will be sought.
AFEW International has already supported projects for people living with HIV in Uzbekistan, and actively involved participants from the country in the AIDS2018 conference. In addition, representatives from Uzbekistan participated in AFEW International’s community based research education project.
