Lessons in regional cooperation learned at Almaty workshop  A Central Asia AIDS Control project financed by an IDA grant was launched last week in Almaty, Kazakhstan, possibly signaling a new trend toward regional efforts to tackle cross-border development challenges.
The regionally administered project will tap an estimated $25 million IDA grant, as well as a £1 million grant from the UK Department for International Development (DfID).
“This regional project aims to close the financial gap needed to provide prevention options for people most at risk, including migrants, prisoners, injecting drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men,” explained Mr. Tilek Meimanaliev, Project Director and former Minister of Health for the Kyrgyz Republic.
The project is being administered by the Central Asia Cooperation Organization, or CACO. It aims to minimize the human and economic impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in four Central Asian countries – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, which are part of the Central Asia Cooperation Organization (CACO). The May 12 project launch workshop brought together representatives from ministries of health, justice, foreign affairs, and social development, NGOs, international policymakers, and the private sector. The event was organized by CACO’s Regional Project Management Unit in co-operation with the World Bank, UNAIDS, and DfID. Central Asia’s epidemic is driven by injecting drug use and is concentrated among young people. It is compounded by a dual epidemic of tuberculosis, which is endemic in prisons. The sub-region has witnessed a dramatic increase in infection rates over the past four years, albeit from a low absolute level. Officially reported cases jumped from about 500 in 2000 to over 12,000 in 2004. Unreported cases are thought to be much larger; the Center for Disease Control and Prevention of the United States estimates that in Central Asia there are some 90,000 people in the sub-region living with HIV/AIDS. “The project has three main goals: reduce the growth rate of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Central Asia in the period 2005-10; establish a Regional AIDS Fund to finance HIV/AIDS prevention and control activities in the Region beyond the end of the project; and contribute to better regional cooperation in Central Asia,” said Joana Godinho, a Senior Health Specialist, who got the Central Asia AIDS Project off the ground as the World Bank Team Leader and has moved to work on the Brazil AIDS Team. Patricio Marquez, Lead Health Specialist in ECA and incoming Team Leader for the Central Asia project, is keen to apply experience from the Multi-Country AIDS Program for the Caribbean that he task-managed for several years before joining ECA in June 2004. A Regional AIDS Fund has been set up under the project to fund initiatives to contain the spread of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in Central Asia. The Fund will provide incentives for greater regional cooperation, as well as cooperation between public and private sector, and between different public services, such as the AIDS centers and prisons. “This Regional Project will complement country-specific activities financed by Governments, the Bank and other partners. Implementing the ambitious goals we have laid out will require continued commitment from top public officials and donors alike,” said Chris Lovelace, World Bank Acting Regional Director for Central Asia..
Carl Brown of the Caribbean Community, or CARICOM, presented to Central Asian counterparts on the regional response against HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean, which is being supported by a Bank-supported Adaptable Program Loan, or APL. Brown described how the Pan Caribbean Partnership Against HIV/AIDS was able to forge a coalition that was ultimately able (with the help of the Clinton Foundation and other partners) to lower the price of anti-retroviral drugs and scale up the fight against AIDS in several Caribbean nations. “We are planning to organize a follow up visit to Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados by the Head of the Central Asia Regional HIV/AIDS Program Unit of CACO and local Bank staff to learn in more detail about the Caribbean experience,” explained Marquez. * * * For more information, see HIV/AIDS in Europe and Central Asia , a special presentation of the World Bank's projects and initiatives helping fight AIDS in the region.
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