This document should be used as a guide to inform and harmonize national and international preparedness and response before, during and after an influenza pandemic. Countries should develop or update national influenza preparedness and response plans that address the recommendations in this Guidance. This document is not intended to replace national plans which should be developed by each country. This Guidance serves as the core strategic document in a suite of materials. It is supported by a complement of pandemic preparedness materials and tools (Figure 1). These documents and tools provide detailed information on a broad range of specific recommendations and activities, as well as clear guidance on their implementation. The individual elements of the guidance package will be made available as they are finalized.
The MoH is currently working to expand the availability of paediatric HIV services. The HIV testing and counseling policy was revised in 2010 to include paediatric testing and counseling,8 and training is on-going for health workers and supervisors. But many providers still lack knowledge about specific paediatric HIV/AIDS issues, and do not have the skills to communicate with caretakers and clients around complex and sensitive issues such as disclosure, dealing with stigma, and the challenges of adherence. In addition, there are few “child/adolescent” friendly services where children and adolescents can feel at ease and receive services and information tailored to their age. Linkages with Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV (PMTCT) services are still limited, leading to missed opportunities for follow-up and getting children on treatment.
This document is a follow-up to the Technical Consultation on Notification, Confidentiality and HIV/AIDS in Windhoek, and the International Consultation on HIV
Reporting and Disclosure (Geneva), and draws from the expertise and input made at these meetings in an effort to offer assistance in answering these questions. It proposes that vital and effective steps towards opening up the HIV/AIDS epidemic involve the encouragement of beneficial disclosure, ethical partner counselling and the appropriate use of HIV case-reporting.
Malaria continues to be the most frequent cause of ill health in Uganda. The greatest toll hits young children and pregnant women. Malaria impacts negatively on the household, community incomes and the national economy, thus keeping the rural communities trapped in perpetual poverty.
The National Policy on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work provides the principles and a framework for mounting an optimum response to HIV/AIDS in the entire Ugandan world of work. It forms the basis for the development of workplace policy guidelines, which address the more specific issues related to the workplace HIV/AIDS response. The policy applies to all employers and workers, including applicants for work, within the public and private sectors.
The National HIV and AIDS Strategic Plan 2015/2016 – 2019/2020 (NSP) was developed to guide implementation of the multi-sectoral response. It provides strategic actions aimed to address the gaps and challenges identified in the Mid-Term Review (MTR) of the National HIV and AIDS Strategic Plan 2011/2012—2014/2015. The NSP builds on the achievements registered in the national response during the previous implementation period. The NSP further builds upon the Vision of the immediate previous National HIV and AIDS Strategic Plan 2011/2012—2014/2015, subscribes to the country’s Vision Statement contained in Uganda Vision 2040, “a Transformed Uganda Society from a Peasant to a Modern and Prosperous Country within 30 Years”.
The M&E Plan will be a key performance management tool for the NSP; it details how data will be aggregated from M&E systems of key sectors and provided to enable reporting against the NDP as well as global targets. Performance monitoring of the NSP is an on-going process that allows decision-makers to determine whether the country is making progress towards achieving the NSP intended results. The M&E Plan therefore provides a framework for generating, managing and utilizing performance information in a timely manner by various stakeholders in the National HIV and AIDS response. The M&E Plan provides a detailed description regarding how M&E will be executed over the NSP period; it also details how the various components of the M&E system will work together to produce timely information for use in program improvement.
The Government of Uganda has identified HIV prevention as a priority in the National Development Plan (2010-15) and set a 40 percent target to reduce new HIV infections by 2015. Although HIV prevalence during the past decade has been stable around 6-7 percent among adults, the number of new HIV infections estimated to be over 120,000 last year, is unacceptably high.
This five-year National Strategic Plan (NSP) for HIV and AIDS is a coordination tool for the national response developed from the efforts and experiences of the national HIV/AIDS Partnership. The Plan sets priorities for the three thematic service areas of Prevention, Care and Treatment and Social Support as well as outlining imperatives for strengthening systems for service delivery. The priorities and imperatives reflect the hard choices made to ensure maximum impact in reducing the incidence of new HIV infections within the limited financial and human resources.
Over the past decade in Uganda, Ministry of Health (MOH) in collaboration with partners, has rolled out comprehensive HIV prevention, care and treatment programs with a sizable focus on Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (PMTCT) and Infant and Young Child Feeding (IYCF).
Globally, new HIV infections among young women (aged 15–24 years) were reduced by 25% between 2010 and 2018. This is good news, but of course, it remains unacceptable that 6000 adolescent girls and young women become infected with HIV every week. The sexual and reproductive health and rights of women and young people are still too often denied.
The World malaria report 2018 estimates that there were 219 million cases of malaria in 2017. The 10 highest burden African countries saw an estimated 3.5 million more malaria cases in 2017 compared with the previous year. Malaria continues to claim the lives of more than 435 000 people each year, largely in Africa. Children under the age of 5 are especially vulnerable; the fact that every two minutes a child dies from this preventable and curable disease is unacceptable.
