Tools and Guidelines

The purpose of this document is to provide guidance to national AIDS programmes and partners actively involved in the country response to AIDS on use of core indicators to measure and report on the national response.

In 2004, the World Health Organization (WHO) published an interim policy on collaborative TB/HIV activities in response to demand from countries for immediate guidance on actions to decrease the dual burden of tuberculosis (TB) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).  These policy guidelines on collaborative TB/HIV activities are a compilation of existing WHO recommendations on HIV-related TB. They follow the same framework as the 2004 interim policy document, structuring the activities under three distinct objectives: establishing and strengthening mechanisms for integrated delivery of TB and HIV services; reducing the burden of TB among people living with HIV and initiating early antiretroviral therapy; and reducing the burden of HIV among people with presumptive TB (that is, people with signs and symptoms of TB or with suspected TB) and diagnosed TB. The updated policy, in contrast to the 2004 policy, recommends offering routine HIV testing to patients with presumptive or diagnosed TB as well as to their partners and family members as a means of reducing the burden of HIV. TB patients who are found to be HIV-positive should be provided with co-trimoxazole preventive therapy (CPT).

This manual is intended to be used primarily to train about the rights of people living with HIV (PLHIV), people affected by HIV and key affected populations as well as about the remedies available to protect those rights in Viet Nam. The purpose of the training manual on HIV and the Law is to provide guidance on how to raise awareness of the rights of PLHIV, people affected by HIV and key affected populations, and how to share information with the legal and PLHIV communities about how to seek justice when those rights are violated.

The Global Fund needs to invest more strategically, to make the most of its resources and maximize the impact and value-for-money of its grants. This new approach, part of a broader change to a new business model, will allow the Global Fund to rebalance and manage its portfolio proactively, to focus investments on the right interventions, in the right countries and on the right populations.

Tackling stigma and discrimination for improved HIV prevention and treatment is particularly critical in Greater Mekong Region (GMR) countries of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), Myanmar, and Thailand, given that the epidemic is concentrated and growing amongst groups who face not only HIV-related stigma and discrimination, but also the underlying and HIV-associated stigmas of sex work, drug use, gender identity, and same-sex relationships.

Clinical trials on PrEP began in 2005. These trials have focused on the effectiveness of PrEP among people who inject drugs, HIV serodiscordant couples, heterosexual men and women, women at higher risk of HIV exposure, and men and transgender women who have sex with men (MSM-TG). Of these, two have completed as planned, one was stopped early for effectiveness, and two others were stopped or had arms discontinued for reasons of futility.

These guidelines recommend increasing the offering of HIV testing and counselling (HTC) to couples and partners, with support for mutual disclosure. They also recommend offering antiretroviral therapy (ART) for HIV prevention in serodiscordant couples.  There are many potential benefits to supporting couples to test together for HIV infection and to mutually disclose their HIV status—most importantly, that together they can then make informed decisions about HIV prevention and reproductive health, including contraception and conception. These benefits are relevant for all couples, whether they have the same HIV test results (HIV seroconcordant) or have different results (HIV serodiscordant). The findings of many published studies suggest that people who learn their HIV status are more likely to adopt preventive behaviours than people who are unaware of their HIV status. 

HIV is the strongest risk factor for developing tuberculosis (TB) disease in those with latent or new Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection. The risk of developing TB is between 20 and 37 times greater in people living with HIV than among those who do not have HIV infection. TB is responsible for more than a quarter of deaths in people living with HIV. On 25–27 January 2010, WHO conducted a global policy meeting to review the evidence regarding ICF and IPT, and to reconceptualize the 1998 WHO/Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Policy on TB prevention. Key questions were identified and a comprehensive review of the available scientific evidence was conducted to formulate the recommendations. The final recommendations take into consideration the quality of evidence, cost, feasibility, and values and preferences of the community and health-care workers.

It’s All One Curriculum: Guidelines and Activities for a Unified Approach to Sexuality, Gender, HIV, and Human Rights Education is the product of contributions from individuals around the world. It’s All One Curriculum offers content on almost any topic you might want to include in teaching young people about gender, sexual health, HIV, sexuality, relationships, communication, intimate-partner violence, puberty, reproduction, contraception, abortion, or advocating for their own rights. It is intentionally comprehensive, so that you can select the content and activities that meet your needs.

As part of scaling up HIV prevention, treatment, care and support services within the context of universal access, countries need up-to-date and robust strategic information. This information is required to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency, equity and acceptability of the HIV services. Information on the efficiency of HIV services requires up-to-date and robust information on the cost and cost–effectiveness of these services. The way to obtain information on cost is to perform a costing study. The aim of this manual is to provide a simple guide on the process of gathering data to calculate the cost of HIV services provided at health facilities.