Private organizations in Ukraine receive $115 M to battle HIV/AIDS (11/12/06)

Private organizations in Ukraine receive $115 M to battle HIV/AIDS

by Zenon Zawada and Olena Labunka
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced on November 7 it has awarded Ukrainian private organizations more than $151 million to spend on HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and care during the next five years.

Ukraine won the second-highest award after India from the Global Fund, which receives its financing from government and private sources mostly within the European Union and the U.S., including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

"This is proof that Ukraine and the Global Fund recognize how threatening the situation is not only for Ukraine itself, but for the global community," said Andrii Klepikov, executive director of the International Alliance of HIV/AIDS in Ukraine, a division of the international charity.

An estimated 400,000 Ukrainians are infected with HIV/AIDS, or about 1 percent of the population, the highest rate among European nations.

If Ukraine's HIV/AIDS epidemic is not curbed, the number of HIV-infected Ukrainians could exceed 800,000 by 2014, according to U.S. government estimates. Infection rates have grown 33 percent annually since 1994.

The Global Fund will provide the first tranche of $30 million to two non-governmental organizations based in Kyiv: the International Alliance of HIV/AIDS in Ukraine and the All-Ukrainian Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS.

The alliance then works with 150 organizations throughout Ukraine in distributing the necessary funds and materials.

Two years ago the Global Fund funded HIV/AIDS programs through the Ministry of Health. However, the grant was suspended because of what Mr. Klepikov described as "certain problems with management and use of funds."

"They were to carry out the programs which were submitted," Mr. Klepikov said of the ministry's officials. "The International Alliance will do this timely and effectively. It's important to recognize that non-government organizations can carry out nationwide programs. There's no monopoly."

That wasn't the last time the Ministry of Health would lose an HIV/AIDS-related grant.

In April of this year the World Bank announced it had suspended a $60 million grant to reduce tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS in Ukraine because the ministry failed to properly distribute the funds.

After three years of implementation, only 2 percent of the $60 million awarded had been distributed, the World Bank reported.

The latest funding will finance the program "Supporting HIV/AIDS Prevention, Treatment and Care for the Most Vulnerable Populations in Ukraine 2007-2011."

Those in Ukraine most vulnerable to HIV/AIDS consists of five groups: drug users, prostitutes, homeless children, homosexuals and prisoners. Most are under the age of 30.

A second focus will be treating those patients with the fully developed AIDS virus, which the government has given up on, Mr. Klepnikov said.

To sign the final agreement, the Ukrainian government must still meet final requirements, which include budget allocations for HIV/AIDS work, constructive negotiations to relaunch the suspended World Bank loan and government support for substitution treatment for intravenous drug use, which remains the driving force behind the HIV epidemic in Ukraine.

The Global Fund's award is the second major international initiative to assist in Ukraine's HIV/AIDS prevention efforts announced in recent months.

The Ukrainian Media Partnership to Fight HIV/AIDS was established on October 16 by three organizations: the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the International Research and Exchange Board (IREX) and the international charity organization Transatlantic Partners Against AIDS.

It will essentially form a partnership of top advertising and media companies in the U.S. and in Ukraine to raise HIV/AIDS awareness, said Earl Gast, the USAID regional director in Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova.

For example, among 15- to 24- year-olds in Ukraine, only 14 percent had a general understanding of how AIDS is contracted and how it can be treated.

The Media Partnership's goals are to encourage mass media companies, consumer goods producers and experts to raise HIV/AIDS awareness, to foster tolerance towards people living with HIV/AIDS and to develop solidarity with people living with HIV/AIDS and other vulnerable groups.

A third goal is to foster a political environment conducive to implementing HIV/AIDS prevention target programs, which will slow the spread of the disease.

The Media Partnership will employ various tools, including targeted advertising, news and entertainment programs, special training and briefings for journalists and free information resources.

The project's television and radio commercials will contain targeted announcements and visual components developed to effectively appeal to young people.

There are even more creative approaches.

"We have taken Russian television writers and editors to Hollywood to learn how to weave HIV/AIDS themes into entertainment programming, like soap operas, even comedies, and we have found this to be an amazingly effective way to get a message out about HIV in a social context," said Dr. John Tedstrom, executive director of the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS.

USAID will work with private partners to provide $2.5 million in funding towards the programs, Mr. Gast said, of which USAID is contributing $880,000.

Among the 400,000 HIV/AIDS-infected Ukrainians, only 100,000 are aware of it, Dr. Tedstrom said.

"Their partners also don't know that they're HIV positive, and that's how this epidemic is going to spread in this country," he said. "And that's how we're going to go from 1 percent prevalence, to 2, 3, 4 percent very quickly."

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