SOMALIA - HIV Humanitarian Overview: (2) Posted on September 23, 2010 at 00:02:33 AM by mb3
Care and treatment:
4,850 Somalis have been trained on integrated prevention, treatment, care and support services in Puntland (41%), South Central (30%) and Somaliland (29%). 5
The Somali HIV Response now has 1 TB centre, 4 functional ART sites (with another under development), 21 VCT centres, 7 sexually transmitted infection (STI) centres, 21 blood safety centres, 6 laboratories, 7 youth centres and 34 media programmes. These integrated prevention, treatment, care and support (IPTCS) centres and programmes are distributed across South Central (44%), Somaliland (28%) and Puntland (28%).
Limited data indicate a significant TB-HIV co-infection problem.
The Joint UN Team on AIDS (JUNTA) will work with partners over the next 12 months on a Joint Strategic Review of the Strategic Framework for the Prevention and Control of HIV/AIDS and STIs within Somali Populations June 2003 – June 2008. This is scheduled to be completed by June 2008 – leading to a revised strategic framework and costed action plan towards Universal Access for all Somalis who need it by 2010.
However, significantly more data and strategic information on the response is urgently required to do this. There is a lack of data and strategic information on most vulnerable/at risk populations. It may be possible that Somalia has a concentrated/low prevalence epidemic amongst vulnerable/at risk populations such as sex workers and their clients, men who have sex with men (MSM), truckers and cross border and other mobile populations.
The Joint UN plan is based on the Strategic Framework on HIV/AIDS and STIs for Somali Populations 2003–2008:
- Strengthened resource mobilization and policy
- Increased awareness and community mobilization
- Increased access to quality HIV-related health and education services
- Comprehensive care and treatment for PLHIV
- Reduction and mitigation of negative impacts of HIV
- Improved knowledge base for response planning management and implementation
- UNICEF is implementing prevention of mother-to-child transmission
- (PMTCT) services in 10 pilot centres in Somaliland, Puntland and South Central. 6
Funding for HIV in humanitarian situations
The four main donors of the Somali HIV Response in 2005 and 2006 were the Global Fund, Italian Cooperation, DFID and UN agencies. The total resources mobilized on HIV through different means in 2005/2006 was USD 15 million, of which USD 12.5 million was spent in 2006.
Global Fund: USD 9,801,377 disbursed as of November 2006. Principal recipient: UNICEF. Main objectives:
- To establish and strengthen management structures for co-ordination, monitoring and evaluation
- To reduce the transmission through strengthened support of prevention services
- To ensure that PLHIV in Somalia and their families have access to high quality, affordable care and support services PEPFAR: None
In June 2007 the World Bank and Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) signed a USD 15 million grant to support the IGAD Regional HIV/AIDS Partnership Program (IRHAPP) to mitigate the impact of HIV among cross-border and mobile populations in IGAD’s member states: Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda. The four-year project will be the first financed by the Africa Catalytic Growth Fund (ACGF). 7
The 2008 Consolidated Appeal for Somalia (CAP) does not contain an Early Recovery pillar (as in 2007). Emergency assistance and early recovery/development will be bridged through the CAP’s complementarity with the United Nations Transition Plan. The 2008 CAP contains the following priorities:
1. Save lives and provide assistance to 1.5 million people identified as being in a state of Humanitarian Emergency or Acute Food and Livelihood Crisis, or as internally displaced, including an estimated 400,000 protracted IDPs and approximately 450,000 newly displaced
2. Improve the protection of, and respect for, the human rights and dignity of vulnerable populations with a special focus on IDPs, women, children, victims of trafficking, and marginalised groups through effective advocacy and the application of a rights-based approach across all sectors
3. Strengthen local capacity for delivery of basic social services and for disaster preparedness and response
The 2008 Consolidated Appeal for Somalia seeks USD 406,235,651 for 155 projects. It will focus on the South/Central region, where the majority of the acute emergency needs lie. The 2007 CAP was 66% funded as of Nov 2007, with food security and mine action both 100% funded.
Humanitarian Response Fund for Somalia (HRF) - Administered by OCHA Somalia since early 2004 to respond to drought, the HRF supports rapid response projects. The HRF was used for a pilot project providing antiretroviral therapy (ART) drugs to refugees in Somaliland in 2005.
Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) – CERF allocations for Somalia in 2007 under the 2 mechanisms of Rapid Response and Under-funded Emergency have, as of early Nov, totaled USD 26.1 million; this figure includes over USD 10.4 million for the flood response and USD 11 million for the IDP response (March-July 2007). Somalia also received USD 1 million in the area of security, which had not been funded under the CAP. A CERF package totaling USD 3.6 million focuses on immediate response to the IDP crisis in Mogadishu-Afgoye was approved in October 2007.
UNHCR launched an appeal for USD 48 million in July 2007 to assist 478,000 refugees and IDPs until the end of next year.
Humanitarian and HIV coordination structures
National:
IPTCS, M&E Reference Group and AIDS working group in Nairobi as well as Puntland, Somalialnd and south central Somalia
The Somali Support Secretariat (SSS) of the Coordination of International Support to Somalis (CISS) is a single, harmonised, transitional secretariat to support the political, planning, and technical coordination between the international community and Somalia through various joint committees. There is an HIV Working Group of the SSS.
UN:
UN Theme Group on HIV/AIDS and
UNDP Representative: Bruno Lemarquis
Chair,
Telephone: +254 2 04 18 36 40
Fax: +254 2 04 18 36 41
E-mail: bruno.lemarquis@undp.org
SOUTH/CENTRAL
Baidoa Sub-office - William Desbordes, Office Tel: + 252 4364143
Cell: + 252 1 528829, Sat: +882 164 333 s8242
Yusuf Ali Salah: Cell: + 252 1559007, Sat: + 882 165 112 1075
OCHA Somalia has 9 international and 15 national staff.
Key international organizations present
UN agencies: FAO, OCHA, UNAIDS, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNFPA, UNIFEM, UNHCR, WFP, WHO
Other agencies: ICRC, IOM,
Key organizations working in HIV in humanitarian situations
All the UN agencies and several local and international nongovernmental organizations.
Training on the IASC guidelines
Staff from each AIDS Commission, UNFPA, OCHA, HIV and AIDS Working Group, Handicap, World Vision International, UNICEF were trained in regional workshops in Kenya in July and November 2006 and March 2007.
NOTES
1. 2008 Somalia CAP
2. UNHCR
3. UNHCR June 2007 in Somalia Health Cluster bulletin, 27 July 2007.
4. Most at risk populations refer to persons engaging in immediate actions that can cause infection, whereas most vulnerable populations refer to persons vulnerable due to personal/ biological factors, and societal, economic, cultural factors.
5. The Global Fund, the Department for International Development (DFID) and the UN (regular budget) funded the training. It was implemented through the technical support of WHO, as well as UNAIDS, UNICEF, and international and local NGOs. CRIS February 2007.
6. CRIS February 2007.
7. World Bank June 2007.