PEPFAR/India Technical Assistance
The PEPFAR programs in India focus largely on providing Technical Assistance to local partners and government agencies to strengthen the response to the HIV epidemic in India. PEPFAR-India focuses on the following areas of technical assistance:
Prevention, Care and Treatment - USG partners made a significant contribution to the development of the third National AIDS Control Program's (NACP-III) care and treatment strategy, including chairing the Care and Treatment Technical Working Groups at national and state levels and helping the National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) to develop overall quality standards and clinical care guidelines. USG supported the development of major operational guidelines under the NACP-III including those on NGO/CBO grant management, link workers, child counseling protocols and review of guidelines for second line ART drug management.
NACO has nominated USG as the lead for public-private-sector partnership (PPP) programs in HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment. In this role, USG has developed the draft national PPP policy and operational guidelines. USG will assist NACO in scaling up programs in the area of care and treatment.
Strategic Information (SI) - SI includes monitoring and evaluation (M&E), surveillance, research, and management information systems. SI is the cornerstone for reliable evidence-based planning and assessing program impact. Under NACP-III, it is planned to decentralize data collection and data use to the state and district level. USG has been identified as one of the national Government's primary technical resources in spearheading its SI initiatives. The USG is rapidly gaining credibility for building capacity at all levels in strengthening data collection, M&E, capacity building and management information systems. USG is a lead participant in the National M&E Working Group, and helped develop the national operational manual for strategic information management. USG also provides technical assistance to State AIDS Control Societies (SACS) for evidence based planning and for developing state and district-level Annual Action Plans.
Health Systems Strengthening - The roll-out of NACP-III has increased the demand for USG assistance in India in several technical and cross-cutting areas including health systems strengthening (HSS). The USG team makes important contributions to strengthening health systems in India by placing advisors at the national and state level in key technical areas and participating with other donors in program development. USG is the only donor that supports the maximum number of Technical Support Units (TSUs) in 6 states of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Goa, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, which are tasked to provide high quality TA in areas of prevention with MARPs, NGO grant management and human capacity development at district and state levels. USG support also includes strengthening national and organizational policies and systems to address human capacity development (HCD), stigma and discrimination, positive prevention and gender issues. USG also supports training programs in both public and private institutions to build the technical and program management capacity of medical providers and local organizations. USG is the lead national coordinating agency for the mentoring program for senior technical and managerial staff at NACO and selected SACS and collaborates with various donors including WHO and UN agencies for developing a coordinated concerted response for human capacity development.
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