National HIV/AIDS/STI/TB Council Acting Director General Mr John Mwale has expressed concern on what he has described as a bias of the national HIV response towards treatment at the expense of prevention interventions. Mr Mwale said the bulk of the external support to Zambia’s HIV and AIDS programming was   skewed towards treatment making it assume the outlook of a medicalized response.

Briefing the new AIDS Health Foundation (AHF) Zambia Country Manager Dr Mabvuto Kango when he paid a courtesy call on him on February 14, 2017, Mr Mwale cited two major funding sources of the AIDS response in Zambia, the American President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and Global Fund to fight AIDS Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM), as being tilted more on treatment, commodity procurement and facility level support.

“For example, most of the US $ 263,386,002 from GFATM for the next three years 2018-2021 is dedicated to treatment as well as much of PEPFAR’s more than US $ 402,000,000 for the current Country Operational Plan with effect from October this year,” said Mr Mwale.

He said AHF had a comparative advantage on prevention of new HIV infections in Zambia through its robust condom programming.

In response, Dr Kango pledged to strengthen AHF’s collaboration with NAC by participating in all the latter’s coordination structures. He encouraged NAC to utilise its mandate of coordination for the benefit of the response.

“Your greatest attribute as NAC is your power to convene all the players in the AIDS sector and as such, we expect that you will regularly call upon all of us to better plan for the response,” Dr Kango said.

Dr Kango brings to the AIDS sector a wealth of experience in health extending beyond the Zambian borders. His last tour of duty before joining AHF was at the African Union Commission in Addis Ababa where he served in two portfolios of Acting Head of Health, Nutrition and Population as well as Senior Policy Officer.

Before his stint at the AU Commission, Dr Kango worked at the Ministry of Health as Deputy Director of Clinical Care as well as Deputy Coordinator-Malaria Case Management and HIV and AIDS Specialist.

Report prepared by the NAC Communications Unit.