The National TB and HIV/AIDS Council approved the country proposal to the Global Fund with the total budget of USD 119 million for TB and HIV response in 2018-2020. It was unanimously resolved that three principal recipients of the grant within the proposal will be the Public Health Center of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine, the Alliance for Public Health and the Network of People Living with HIV. For the first time, delegates from the communities of key populations – people who inject drugs, men who have sex with men and sex workers – took part in the meeting of the National Council as its full-fledged members.

The structure of the proposal is based on the gradual growth of the country leadership, with relevant increase in the financing of the Global Fund. Pavlo Rozenko, Chair of the National Council underlined: “The new proposal includes financing activities aimed at overcoming the epidemics of HIV and tuberculosis, improving the quality of services and expanding the opioid substitution treatment. The underlying strategy of the proposal stipulates the mechanism of step-by-step transition of the responsibility for implementation of the program activities from three recipients of the grant to one recipient – government”.

“We appreciate cooperation of the government sector with non-government organizations: together, we will be able to achieve the ambitious goals set forth in the proposal to the Global Fund. We expect that in the course of implementation of the three-year program the share of state funding, in particular aimed at working with the populations most vulnerable to HIV, will be growing”, pointed out Andriy Klepikov, Executive Director of the Alliance for Public Health.

The proposal is to be submitted to the Global Fund on 23 May at the latest, and the final decision of the donor is expected in summer.