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| UPCOMING EVENTS |
World TB Day
USAID will commemorate World Tuberculosis Day with a series of events during the week leading up to March 24. These events will feature TB survivors and honor champions of the fight against TB. Look out for briefings on the Hill, panel discussions, and a high-level event at the Newseum. Recognizing the significant presence of TB/HIV co-infection, OHA will actively support these events.
Launch of GH Journal
The Global Health: Science and Practice journal will be launched on March 26 at the National Press Club. Register here to attend! This journal is a joint collaboration between USAID, Johns Hopkins University Center for Communication Programs and Bloomberg School of Public Health, the George Washington School of Public Health, and K4Health. The purpose of the journal is to highlight research that leads to better global health programs and creates stronger, more impactful results.
AIDS Vaccine Conference Journalist Fellowship Program
The AIDS Vaccine conference, hosted by the Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise and the Catalan Program for HIV Research (HIVACAT), will be held in Barcelona, Spain, October 7-10. Applications are being accepted from qualified journalists for a handful of fellowships to attend the conference and participate in 2 days of background briefings. Successful applicants will have a track record of high-quality reporting on HIV/AIDS issues, the support of their media outlet to attend and report on the conference, and strong English language speaking and reading skills. Applications must be received by April 28, 2013. Apply here!
Happy 10th Anniversary, PEPFAR!
This year marks the 10th anniversary of PEPFAR. President George W. Bush first called for an emergency plan for AIDS relief in his 2003 State of the Union. The U.S. Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act (establishing PEPFAR) was signed into law on May 27, 2003. OGAC and PEPFAR implementing agencies are discussing plans to commemorate the 10th anniversary of PEPFAR. Stay tuned for more information and feel free to share your ideas with us!
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...for blogs, success stories, videos, or other news items that highlight and tell the story of your organization’s work under the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). We love featuring our partners’ work in HIV/AIDS on the Agency’s Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and website platforms.
Contact Goli Fassihian at gfassihian@usaid.gov and Molly Schmalzbach at mschmalzbach@usaid.gov for more information.
Welcome to Molly Schmalzbach: Public Affairs Analyst in OHA
We are pleased to welcome Molly Schmalzbach to the public affairs team in OHA.
Molly has a diverse range of experience working on issues related to global health and Africa. Prior to her current position, Molly was a research associate with the Global Health Policy Center at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), where she played an active role at AIDS 2012. She was a 'Princeton in Africa Fellow' in South Africa at mothers2mothers, an international non-governmental organization that works to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV. She also consulted for the World Bank on HIV/AIDS and social safety nets in southern Africa, and served as the Acting Political Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Lilongwe, Malawi.
Molly received her M.P.P. from the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and her B.A. in Sociology and African/African-American Studies from the University of Virginia.
You can reach Molly by email at mschmalzbach@usaid.gov or by phone at (202) 712-0311.
HIV/AIDS in the Next 4 Years
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This past World AIDS Day, former Secretary Hillary Clinton released the PEPFAR Blueprint, which lays out the U.S. Government strategy to achieve an AIDS-free generation. UNAIDS also shared their annual World AIDS Day Report announcing data and results from global HIV/AIDS efforts around the world. For more information on USAID’s World AIDS Day activities, please check out our World AIDS Day news.
The conversation around an AIDS-free generation has continued to evolve in 2013. President Obama emphasized the importance of this goal by announcing in his State of the Union address that the United States will join with our allies to eradicate extreme poverty “by realizing the promise of an AIDS-free generation, which is within our reach.” Secretary John Kerry further underscored this message in his first public foreign policy speech by declaring that PEPFAR has saved over five million lives and “we are standing on the edge of the potential of an AIDS-free generation.”
The HIV/AIDS community is hard at work collaborating on policy efforts and developing recommendations for how to achieve the goal of an AIDS-free generation. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Global Health Policy Center recently published a report on “Global Health Policy in the Second Obama Term,” with recommendations on U.S. priorities for HIV/AIDS. The Institute of Medicine has also released its congressionally-mandated evaluation of PEPFAR, which offered high praise for the role PEPFAR has played in stemming the HIV/AIDS pandemic and recommendations for its strategy going forward.
USAID at the World Economic Forum
At the World Economic Forum in Davos this past January, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah gave the keynote address at the United Parcel Service (UPS) breakfast titled “The Role of the Private Sector in Delivering Essential Drugs to the Communities in Need.” The Administrator highlighted the Supply Chain Management System (SCMS) project and emphasized the importance of the last mile of the supply chain. He hailed USAID’s supply chain as the most effective global health supply chain system in the world, reaching tens of millions of people every year with medicines to fight HIV/AIDS.
Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections
The Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) took place in Atlanta March 3-6. This scientifically focused meeting convened the world’s leading researchers working to understand, prevent, and treat HIV/AIDS and its complications. Several members of OHA and our implementing partners participated in CROI this year by presenting abstracts and contributing to the discussion of scientific issues, including final results from the National Institutes of Health-funded VOICE trial, conducted by the Microbicide Trials Network.
International Women’s Day
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| Photo Credit: Pathfinder |
USAID commemorated International Women’s Day on Friday, March 8. Check out PEPFAR's revised Fact Sheet: Addressing Gender and HIV/AIDS. USAID’s Global Health Bureau also hosted a call for photos to showcase women champions around the world who have benefited from or who work on USAID-funded health projects. Selected photos were featured on the USAID website, used in an e-card sent to our external distribution list, and highlighted on the Global Health Bureau’s Twitter and Facebook accounts.
Supply Chain Summit
SCMS and USAID | DELIVER PROJECT are combining their two planned conferences into a joint 2013 Strategic Leadership Summit held March 11-13. The purpose of this summit is to set the strategic priorities for the U.S. Government’s major supply chain projects from now until September 2015. Assistant Administrator for Global Health Ariel Pablos-Mendez is giving opening remarks.
OHA in the News
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| Photo Credit: Christian Viseux, Internews |
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IMPACTblogs – LATEST & GREATEST ON HIV & AIDS
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| Photocredit: International Partnership for Microbicides |
- Microbicides, Vaccines, and TB Diagnostics Oh My! What’s New in HIV/AIDS Research?, Molly Schmalzbach, Public Affairs Analyst, Office of HIV/AIDS, USAID – March 5, 2013
- Germany’s Renewed Support: Another Leap Forward for the Global Fund, Molly Schmalzbach, Molly Schmalzbach, Public Affairs Analyst, Office of HIV/AIDS, USAID – January 30, 2013
- The Story Behind the Headline: Investments in Implementation Science Tackle HIV Prevention in Swaziland, Emily Harris, Public Health Advisor, Office of HIV/AIDS, USAID – January 30, 2013
Partner in Spotlight
Pfizer’s Global Health Fellows (GHF) program is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. Since 2003, this program has been a major component of Pfizer Inc.’s corporate social investment strategy. GHF places colleagues from technical and functional areas across Pfizer in 3-6 month fellowships with non-profit organizations around the world to improve health services for people in greatest need. USAID is a key partner of the GHF program and also an important donor to many of the organizations where fellows are placed.
NEW STAFF
Robert Ferris – Bob has been selected to serve as Chief of the Technical Leadership and Research Division (TLR) in OHA. Prior to becoming division chief, he led TLR's Counseling, Testing, Care and Treatment Team (CT2), served as a senior USAID HIV Treatment Advisor, and co-chaired both PEPFAR's adult treatment technical working group and HIV care & treatment steering committee. Bob can be reached at rferris@usaid.gov.
Nida Parks – Nida has joined the Implementation Support Division as a Health Officer and will be working on the Cross-Sector Team. Nida is a second-tour Foreign Service Health Officer and comes to us from the Southern Africa Regional HIV/AIDS Program office in Pretoria. Nida can be reached at nparks@usaid.gov.
Reden Sagana – Reden works as a Supply Chain Advisor in the Supply Chain for Health Division. Prior to joining USAID as a global health fellow, he worked for Chemonics International where he managed the Kenya Pharma project and Crown Agents USA on the SCMS project. Reden can be reached at rsagana@usaid.gov.
Chutima Suraratdecha – The Health Systems Strengthening Team in OHA’s Strategic Planning Evaluation and Reporting (SPER) Division is pleased to welcome Chutima as Senior Health Economist. Prior to joining USAID, she was a Senior Principal Technical Advisor in Health Economics and Financing and served as a Global Technical Lead in Universal Health Coverage at MSH. Chutima can be reached at csuraratdecha@usaid.gov.
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Photo credit from header: Virginia Lamprecht, Courtesy of Photoshare.
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