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Resource | Publications,
This book aims to inform networks of people living with HIV (PLHIV) and concerned civil society organisations about how patents can make their medicines more expensive and what they can do about it. It provides a step-by-step basic guide to enable these stakeholders to minimise the number of medicines that are patented in their country, and still ensure that medicines are affordable even if they are patented. The book also explains how some free trade agreements and other treaties can make medicines even more expensive.
This book gives concrete examples of how PLHIV networks in partnership with key partners have reduced the impact of patents on medicines, including for medicines for the wider population in Thailand and India. It provides a clear illustration of how small local and national actions led by PLHIV can generate tremendous global impacts in today's borderless and inter-connected world.
Resource | Publications,
Factors such as stigma and discrimination, poverty, criminalization of drug use, sex work and homosexuality, limited antiretroviral therapy (ART) service facilities and lack of trained healthcare professionals on HIV treatment have all been cited as barriers to HIV treatment access for people living with HIV (PLHIV). Although studies have also provided the frameworks for understanding and addressing how gender and sexuality, employment and drug use-based social status have impeded our goal of delivering treatment, care and support to marginalized communities; progress in achieving equitable access on essential HIV healthcare services remains disappointingly slow.
In 2008, the Asia Pacific Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (APN+) conducted a network-based research project aiming to explore the experience of women, men who have sex with men/transgender people (MSM/TG) and injecting drug users (IDUs) living with HIV in accessing ART and other HIV-related healthcare services.
Resource | Publications,
The Commission on AIAIDS in Asia publicly released its report Redefining AIDS in Asia: Crafting an Effective Response, in March 2008, by handing it over to the UN Secretary General Mr Ban Ki-moon in New York. Since its publication, the report has attracted the attention of both policy makers and academics working in the field of HIV.
Many have requested access to the background papers that formed the basis of the Commission’s report. This Technical Annex is an attempt to put the evidence collected by the Commission in the course of its work into the public domain.
The studies included in this Annex, as one can see, cover a wide range of themes like epidemiology, unit costing, assessing the total resource need, cost-effectiveness and socio-economic impact in general and in particular on women, children and young people. Research material bearing on legislation, impact mitigation and effectiveness of HIV programmes has also been presented.
Many areas addressed in this Technical Annex are either new or not previously discussed adequately. Some of these include providing a clear quantitative basis for prioritization of most-at-risk populations; estimating the unit cost of interventions; measuring the impact in financial terms at the household level; and quantifying addition to poverty due to HIV.
Resource | Publications,
In South-East Asia, mobility is a growing phenomenon and a major concern due to the high vulnerability to HIV of mobile populations. The dynamics of population movement have evolved in South-East Asia over the last decade, and are in a phase of acceleration due to multiple factors including geopolitical and socio-economic changes, infrastructure development and closer cooperation among ASEAN Member Countries. Whether mobility is internal or cross-border, whether it is voluntary or forced, this increasing population movement generates particular conditions and circumstances that render migrants vulnerable and at risk of HIV infection.
This document presents the key findings and recommendations of a rapid assessment conducted on HIV and mobility issues in the 10 ASEAN Member Countries in 2007-2008. It includes the migration patterns and HIV situation across the region, and the challenges and opportunities facing South-East Asian countries as they work together to develop a comprehensive response to HIV for migrant and mobile populations.
Resource | Publications,
The Arab States are the primary destinations for many migrant workers from various countries in Asia, including Bangladesh, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka. Of these migrants, many are women: in 2005, 59 percent of Sri Lankan migrant workers were women, of which 90 percent were domestic workers, largely in the Arab States. Since 2000, women have comprised 90 percent of yearly deployment of new hires for service workers in the Philippines, of which 30 percent are employed as domestic help. A similar preference for the Arab States is observed in the case of Bangladesh, where between 1991 and 2007, 60 percent of female migrants left to find employment in the Arab States.
By analyzing the economic, socio-cultural, and political factors that influence the HIV vulnerability of migrant workers - especially female migrant workers - the study aims to aid the design of appropriate rights-based HIV prevention programmes. It also is intended to identify emerging challenges and trends in the response to HIV and migration issues in host countries, particularly in the area of human rights and public health.
Resource | Publications,
ADB Regional Technical Assistance (RETA 6247) was financed by the Poverty Reduction Cooperation Fund from the United Kingdom's Department for International Development, with parallel financing from UNESCO. This RETA 6247 was, in part, a continuation of the previous RETA (RETA 6083, ICT and Preventive Education in the Cross-border Areas of the Greater Mekong Sub-region). However, it also built and expanded on the lessons identified from the previous project. The earlier RETA, jointly carried out by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), UNESCO and SEAMEO, was implemented during the period April 2003 to September 2004. Under it, ADB/UNESCO pioneered the use of linguistically and culturally appropriate materials in the form of radio soap operas (dramas) for transmitting HIV/AIDS, drug and trafficking prevention information to highly vulnerable ethnic minority populations often living in remote areas in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS). It further established the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for mapping, tracking and monitoring the spread of HIV/AIDS in Thailand, as well initiating the UNESCO-based Clearing House (CH) on Preventive HIV/AIDS education in the GMS.
Resource | Publications,
Children have been called the missing face of HIV and AIDS. While countries and regions have marshaled resources to respond to the HIV epidemic, children and young people infected and affected by HIV and AIDS have received little, if any, attention. In March 2006, participants in the three day East Asia and Pacific Regional Consultation on Children and HIV & AIDS, held in Hanoi, Viet Nam, issued the ‘Hanoi Call to Action’. It appealed to national and regional leaders to put children firmly on the agenda in their HIV response. Two years later, many of those who attended the Hanoi consultation gathered in Bangkok to take stock of what progress had been made and what gaps still existed in efforts to protect, treat and care for children infected and affected by HIV and AIDS in the East Asia and Pacific region.
Convened by the UNICEF East Asia and Pacific Regional Office, the Regional Partnership Forum on Children and HIV and AIDS (or “Forum”) brought together 133 representatives from 17 countries and organizations. The forum was held from 31 March to 2 April 2008 at the Imperial Queen’s Park Hotel in Bangkok, Thailand.
This report highlights the substantial inputs and discourses made during the three-day Forum. It outlines several action points that aim to minimize the impact of HIV and AIDS on children and young people and to prevent the continuing spread of HIV by protecting children and young people from a host of vulnerability and risk factors that drive the spread of HIV in the region.
Resource | Publications,
The HIV epidemiological situation varies greatly within and between Pacific Island countries and territories (PICT), with epidemics increasing in different places at different speeds and with different intensities. By the end of 2004, many countries were identified as low prevalence epidemics reporting less than 10 HIV infections (e.g., American Samoa, Cook Islands, Nauru, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, and Wallis and Futuna). While statistics of person living with HIV (PLWH) might appear small in many countries, these can reflect high rates of infection because of their tiny populations—and the potential impact can be great. As Jenkins (2005) explains, “the distribution of recorded infections might be viewed in different ways. The ‘cumulative incidence per 100,000’ is a good indicator of the potential impact of HIV on the local population. Even small numbers of cases in small populations (e.g., Tuvalu), particularly if found among young working men, can have a devastating impact at the local level.” Only nine people in Tuvalu have been diagnosed with HIV. However, with a population of only 9,600, the rate of infection in Tuvalu is close to that of French Polynesia and Guam, which have some of the highest numbers of HIV infections in the Pacific outside of PNG.
Resource | Publications,
AIDS is an extraordinary disease. As such, it requires an extraordinary response.
In South Asia, the HIV epidemic is heterogeneous in nature. Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan have HIV
epidemics that are primarily driven by injecting drug use. India — a country with one of the largest numbers of people living with HIV/AIDS — features an epidemic in its North Eastern region which is primarily driven by injecting drug use. Bhutan, the Maldives and Sri Lanka are countries with growing number of injecting drug users. This document examines whether the laws and policies currently in South Asia are adequate to meet the challenges posed by the threat of HIV/AIDS.
A consistent body of evidence has established that comprehensive HIV prevention programmes which
include needle syringe programmes and oral substitution as part of a comprehensive package reduce drug-related HIV risk behavior (such as needle sharing, unsafe injecting, and frequency of injection). Similarly, there is strong evidence that substitution treatment reduces criminal behavior and illicit opioid use. It also increases treatment retention and improves the overall health status of drug users infected with HIV. These are outcomes which we all seek to promote.
Resource | Presentations,
Scientific advances over the past 20 years have shown that drug addiction is a chronic, relapsing disease that results from the prolonged effects of drugs on the brain. As with many other brain diseases, addiction has embedded behavioral and social-context aspects that are important parts of the disorder itself. Therefore, the most effective treatment approaches will include biological, behavioral, and social-context components. Recognizing addiction as a chronic, relapsing brain disorder characterized by compulsive drug seeking and use can impact society's overall health and social policy strategies and help diminish the health and social costs associated with drug abuse and addiction.