On July 30, 2008, the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008 was signed into law. This law authorized the U.S. Government, through the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) to establish Partnership Frameworks with partner countries. These Frameworks promote a more sustainable approach to combating HIV/AIDS and help to strengthen country capacity, ownership, and leadership, ultimately saving more lives.
Partnership Frameworks provide a 5-year joint strategic framework for cooperation among the U.S. Government, the partner government, and other partners to combat HIV/AIDS in the partner country through service delivery, policy reform, and coordinated financial commitments. Partnership Frameworks serve as the foundation for the Partnership Framework Implementation Plan, which spells out in more detail the 5-year objectives, contributions, and targets for the Partnership Framework. The Implementation Plans describe how the Partnership Framework will be implemented and monitored, indicating priorities, approaches to achieving goals and objectives, planned funding levels, and indicators of success. They describe the long-term transition plans of U.S. Government-supported services, in order to ensure the sustainability of these programs.
As of April 2011, 21 Partnership Frameworks had been signed with countries and regions across the globe:
These Partnership Frameworks are available online at: www.pepfar.gov/frameworks/.
The following regional and country highlights represent unique examples of the Partnership Framework process.
The South Africa Partnership Framework was signed by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton as part of the State Department’s overall U.S.-South Africa bilateral forum. The South African Government has assumed increasing leadership, including a dramatically heightened financial contribution to HIV/AIDS and an intention to approach full financial responsibility for its program in the near future. A health working group, with representation from both governments, will jointly develop the Partnership Framework Implementation Plan. Joint planning at this high level represents an important example of how the Partnership Framework process supports a country-led response to the epidemic.
The Caribbean Regional Partnership Framework was signed in April 2010 by the U.S. Government, 12 countries in the Caribbean, and two regional organizations, the Caribbean Community’s Pan Caribbean Partnership against HIV/AIDS (PANCAP) and the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), and is the culmination of extensive collaboration between all signatories. The regional program maintains continual communication with all of the Ministries of Health and National AIDS Programs in the region, including annual work planning. This Partnership Framework is significant because the regional platform provides technical collaboration with governments and civil society to build local capacity, rather than providing direct support and services.
The Nigeria Partnership Framework is harmonized with the Government of Nigeria’s HIV/AIDS and overall health system strengthening strategies. The Partnership Framework encourages country ownership by supporting the identified needs and strengthening the country government, while also outlining specific activities that will transition to the Government of Nigeria. One goal is for the Government of Nigeria to finance 50% of the cost for Universal Access by 2015, an increase from approximately 7% of this cost in 2010. The U.S. Government will facilitate this transition by identifying and creating clear opportunities for incremental increases in Government of Nigeria funding responsibility.
Health diplomacy has been essential to building trust and improving relations between the U.S. and Vietnam. PEPFAR is the largest health program in Vietnam, supporting the prevention, care and treatment of HIV/AIDS among infected and affected most-at-risk populations since 2003. In July 2010, Secretary Clinton signed the Vietnam Partnership Framework on behalf of the U.S. Government. The Partnership Framework reinforces the leadership of the Government of Vietnam to addressing its HIV epidemic, as well as its commitment to the broader health needs of its people. The Partnership Framework process put into place a critical, ongoing strategic dialogue between multilateral organizations and across separate, but relevant, ministries within the government. The Vietnam Partnership Framework represents an important consensus on the part of these key stakeholders about the importance of maintaining the focus on most-at-risk populations as a crucial component of the response to the epidemic.
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