Sharps Kits, Syringes and Solidarity

In Philadelphia, an HIV-prevention group has partnered with another youth-focused social services organization to connect patients experiencing homeless or housing insecurity with appropriate resources. By offering wellness and housing services in one location, the partnership is making accessing help a lot easier for the vulnerable populations they serve.

The M-Pima kit is a quick, easy to use device to accurately measure the HIV load in a blood sample. With this tool, clinics lacking in technology or staff expertise don't have to send samples to places with these resources, but rather can use the kit to obtain the same information in an hour.

Two of America’s largest cities, New York City and San Francisco, are working to reduce HIV rates by bringing better health care options closer to the communities and connecting individuals with resources such as insurance and payment methods. Although the two cities are using different approaches, both are seeing early success in fighting against the epidemic.

In light of a study published in BMC Medicine, authors Nancy Fullman and Alexandra Wollum take a deeper dive into Nigeria’s gains against polio and what they could mean for the country’s routine vaccine systems.

Three African countries are successfully reducing the transmission of HIV through treatment and education, surpassing many developed countries in reducing cases. Although each is unique, the key lessons include using comprehensive, community-based approaches and strategies that involve collective action.

The WOMAN ORGANISATION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS ADVOCACY (WONETHA) provides free condoms to sex workers in Uganda to end the spread of HIV. The group distributes about four to five million condoms to regional centers. Everyone can access the free condoms simply by request, without facing stigma or discrimination. The group also carries out “sensitization” campaigns that teach sex workers how to practice safe sex and feel empowered to require condom use among clients. They also work with health care systems to address discrimination and social stigmas that sex workers often face when seeking health care.

The city of Baltimore escaped the worst of COVID-19 with high vaccination rates, high rates of health coverage, and strong support from political leaders who cooperated across ideological lines. Medicaid expansion helped achieve relatively high health insurance rates. Officials were also a bit more and cautious in reopening businesses and schools and relaxing mask requirements. The city didn’t escape the death and illness seen during the pandemic, but for these reasons it fared better than comparable areas.

South Korea has taken a softer approach to preventing and containing the coronavirus, in large part because they’ve prioritized accessible testing and have an already-existing strong and affordable healthcare system. Beyond that, the government has centered on citizen education – sending daily updates about new cases and provided a hotline for questions and concerns.

There are over one million people in the United States living with HIV, reaching a crisis level in states such as Georgia; however, countries like Namibia are offering lessons for how to tackle the problem. By offering a community-centered approach that addresses underlying issues like poverty and lack of access to education, the country has seen a significant decrease in new diagnoses.

Thanks to a proactive three-part approach, San Francisco, California is on track to become the first city in the nation to reduce new HIV transmissions and thus HIV-related deaths. Now a model for other major metropolitan cities to follow, the city has seen success from rapid testing and antiretroviral therapy, actively prescribing PrEP, and an implementation of a network of outreach workers.