July 2011

Efforts to Eliminate Pediatric AIDS in Zimbabwe Accelerate as Vehicles Are Handed Over to MoH

July 4, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Caroline Zinyemba, Communications & Advocacy Officer, Tanzania, 302144/302279

July 4, 2011, Harare, Zimbabwe – The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) delivered the first batch of 30 vehicles to the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare in its continued support of the elimination of pediatric AIDS in Zimbabwe. The vehicles are an essential element of the elimination campaign to ensure that the Ministry’s district health workers are equipped to travel throughout the districts to provide necessary program implementation, support supervision, and peer mentoring to the health care providers on the ground.

Significant strides have continued to be made since the official launch in January 2011 of the national agenda to eliminate pediatric AIDS in Zimbabwe. To date, key milestones include:

  • Handover of the first batch of Point of Care CD4 machines in April
  • Recruitment of 30 District Focal Persons deployed in May
  • Provision of technical and financial resources to revise the national prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) training materials in accordance with the WHO 2010 guidelines
  • Training of National and Provincial Trainers on the new PMTCT materials

EGPAF was awarded the first year of a five-year $45-million USD grant by the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF) to accelerate the scale-up of more effective antiretroviral regimens to reduce HIV transmission from mother- to-child in Zimbabwe, and to ensure that HIV-positive mothers can access treatment for their own health. The strengthened partnership between EGPAF and the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare will ensure that the lessons learned from Zimbabwe will be used to implement similar programs in other high burden countries, and to strengthen efforts to eliminate pediatric HIV and AIDS globally.

###

About the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation:
The Foundation is a global leader in the fight against pediatric HIV and AIDS, and has reached more than 12.2 million women with services to prevent transmission of HIV to their babies. It currently works at more than 5,500 sites in 17 countries to implement prevention, care, and treatment services; to further advance innovative research; and to execute strategic and targeted global advocacy activities in order to bring dramatic change to the lives of millions of women, children, and families worldwide.