Three Billion for HIV & TB

The Global Fund Board has approved an estimated R3 billion for HIV and TB programmes throughout the nine provinces of South Africa. This is the largest Global Fund grant that the country has ever received and will enable South Africa to fund services for high risk and neglected communities such as sex workers and men who have sex with men. The approval follows a proposal from the SANAC Global Fund Country Coordinating Mechanism (CCM), a body that represents government departments, civil society, the PLHIV sector, the private sector, provincial AIDS councils and development partners.

“This is the largest grant we have ever received from a multi-sectoral donor in the history of our fight against AIDS and TB,” said Deputy President, Kgalema Motlanthe, chairperson of SANAC “This additional funding will allow us to expand our programmes for the treatment of AIDS and TB, but also for the important work that we are doing to prevent new infections of HIV and TB.”

The funds will be distributed to five Principal Recipients (PRs), including:

• The National Department of Health (NDoH).
• Networking AIDS Community of South Africa (NACOSA).
• Right to Care (RTC).
• National Religious Association for Social Development (NRASD).
• Western Cape Provincial Department of Health (WCDoH).

The sixth PR is still to be identified.

These programmes will support the work of five government departments – the National Department of Health, the Western Cape Department of Health, the Department of Social Development, the Department of Basic Education and the Department of Higher Education – and more than 100 NGOs throughout the country.

Health Minister, Aaron Motsoaledi, was ecstatic about the grant saying, ”the grant will allow us to provide AIDS and TB screening and testing services to all prisoners in South Africa. I have been looking forward to the day that we have the funds to be able to address the high disease burden in South Africa’s inmate population where the probability of contracting TB is 90% for stays of 6 months and longer.”

The R3 billion covers a period of two-and-a-half years and the probability of renewing this grant for another three years is very high. The funds will allow for the provision of the following services:

• Antiretroviral treatment for 350,000 patients.
• Adherence support programmes for almost 500,000 patients.
• HIV testing for more than one million people, including in rural areas and farms.
• Full screening for TB of all inmates in 258 correctional services facilities.
• Screening for more than 400,000 miners and their families in communities surrounding small mines, plus referral to public health facilities.
• Prevention and referral services for 33,000 sex workers (22% of population) in all nine provinces.
• Prevention and referral services for 150,000 men who have sex with men.
• Care and support for more than 40,000 orphans.
• Medical male circumcisions for 94,500 men.

Dr Fareed Abdullah, CEO of SANAC and the head of the team that submitted the proposal to the Global Fund, said that the new funding allows us to tackle prevention in a way that we have never done before.

‘We have 370 000 new HIV infections each year in South Africa and we need to run effective prevention programmes if we are to beat this epidemic. The Global Fund grant will allow us to tackle the causes of new infections in young women between the ages of 15 and 24 and also in high risk populations such as sex workers and MSM.’

Dr Mark Dybul, the Executive Director of the Global Fund who addressed the media through a recorded video message said, ‘South Africa presented us with a very well written proposal and we felt compelled to fund it. We believe that the world will not win against AIDS if South Africa does not win against AIDS. The Global Fund is proud to be working in such a close partnership with South Africa to tackle AIDS and TB’.