The United States has pledged to contribute N$1.4 billion (US$90.4 million) in 2022 towards Namibia’s fight against AIDS through the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).
This is an increase from N$1.3 billion (US$89 million) contributed in 2021.
“Namibia has made strides in the fight against HIV and is a global leader in nearing epidemic control. PEPFAR supports a number of different interventions that will bring Namibia closer to epidemic control and strengthen Namibia’s health care system,” U.S. Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Jess Long announced on Wednesday.
“In 2022, PEPFAR Namibia will support the Ministry of Health and Social Services (MoHSS) to further scale up interventions which began in 2021, including programs addressing mental and emotional health in patients on anti-retroviral therapy (ART).”
Additional activities included in the 2022 investment are support for recency testing, which is a procedure that shows the healthcare worker how recently a person was infected with HIV.
Funding for 2022 will also support the Ministry of Health and Social Services to set up an SMS reminder service to send messages to ART patients when they need to collect their medicine.
“Through this support, together, we will work with the Namibian government to realize its vision of universal health coverage, so that all people in Namibia have access to affordable, quality health services,” said Long.
The 2022 funding period begins in October of 2021 and ends in September of 2022, which is the U.S. government’s fiscal year.
The United States government has invested approximately N$24.3 billion (US$1.6 billion) in HIV programming in Namibia since 2005.
