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ICAP LAUNCHES NEW HOME Linda Fried, Dean of Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health, joined ICAP Director Wafaa El-Sadr in leading the ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the opening of ICAP’s new offices at the Mailman School’s Allen Rosenfield Building on March 7.
After two years of planning and renovations, the vibrant, state-of-the-art offices house key leadership and regional directors who support ICAP’s global work. The offices are LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified, which means they use resources more efficiently to minimize the impact to the environment.
El-Sadr shared her sentiments on the move during a ceremony attended by ICAP staff, partners, and Mailman School deans: “This is a wonderful home, and we are thrilled to be here.” El-Sadr thanked the leadership of the School for their commitment to ICAP and their belief in the value of its work.
Dean Linda Fried noted, “This beautiful space at the heart of Mailman is symbolically appropriate because ICAP is at the heart of the school. We believe deeply in what ICAP and the Mailman School are accomplishing on behalf of the world’s wellbeing. It’s a collective effort led by talented people.”
The event coincided with the 2011 ICAP Leadership Meeting hosted in New York City from March 7-11.
For photos of the event, click here
From Congo to Central Asia: ICAP’s Work in New Regions
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), one of the first sub-Saharan African countries to recognize the HIV/AIDS epidemic, has between 400,000 and 500,000 people living with HIV, and recent USAID reports suggest that this number is growing. ICAP’s work in DRC was launched in April 2010 to focus on three areas: health systems strengthening, the integration of HIV and TB services, and adult and pediatric HIV prevention, care, and treatment programs.
Several thousand miles and a continent away, Central Asia is experiencing its own set of unique challenges as its health care systems continue to evolve after the collapse of the Soviet Union 20 years ago. The HIV epidemic throughout the region, while with lower overall HIV prevalence in the general population than in sub-Saharan Africa, is characterized by an alarming increase in the annual number of new infections. High rates of injection drug users and a growing migrant population who lack access to health care also contribute to the rapid spread of HIV. The new ICAP team in Central Asia will focus its work on providing technical assistance to strengthen facility-based HIV prevention, care, and support services, as well as to enhance strategic information systems.
On March 11, Anna Deryabina, ICAP’s regional project director for Central Asia, and Faustin Malele, ICAP country director for DRC, described to an overflowing room of faculty and students at the Mailman School of Public Health the most pressing issues they face as they develop these new activities. Malele noted that DRC struggles with a weak public health system and relies heavily on international faith-based organizations to deliver a large proportion of health services. Deryabina pointed to the fragile health infrastructure as a main obstacle throughout Central Asian countries. However, both speakers expressed their great enthusiasm in tackling the challenges ahead in carrying out their respective programs, from staffing the new country offices to collaborating with the governmental and community organizations in the areas.
Global Health at the Crossroads: Film Screening and Panel Discussion
“Before, when the time arrived to have [HIV] blood tests, you would start thinking about bus fare. But now we don’t need to think about it, because we just walk five minutes to the clinic,” noted one patient in Kigoma, Tanzania. The patient is featured in the film, “ICAP Health Systems Strengthening,” which can be viewed on ICAP’s YouTube Channel. The film provides a window into health systems strengthening conducted at the ground level by ICAP, notably the delivery of services in remote villages, renovations to laboratories, improved methods of data collection and evaluation, and peer educator programs.
On March 7, ICAP country directors from Swaziland, Tanzania, Nigeria, and Lesotho joined ICAP Director Wafaa El-Sadr and Senior Research Director Elaine Abrams for a screening of the film and a panel discussion.
The panel was moderated by Abrams and included several ICAP country directors who discussed several issues highlighted by the film including the role of peer workers and evolving capacity of nurses among other topics.
For photos of the event, click here
Survey Results for Program and Facility Characteristics Reaches New High
The ICAP Monitoring and Evaluation team has collected the results from the fifth round of the Program and Facility Characteristics Tracking System (PFaCTS) survey conducted in September 2010 across nine ICAP-supported countries (Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Swaziland, and Tanzania). The PFaCTS survey is conducted once a year to evaluate programs and aid in planning. The survey captures information on site characteristics (e.g., catchment area); context (e.g., estimated HIV prevalence among women attending antenatal care); available services at the site (e.g., ART pharmacy and lab services); facility characteristics (e.g., number of exam rooms); and staffing (e.g., how many physicians, turnover rate).
This round of survey results notably achieved the highest completion rate to date, with 97 percent of ICAP-supported HIV care and treatment facilities completing a PFaCTS assessment in June 2010.
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