Angola

Angola

Since the early 2000s and the end of a nearly 30-year civil war, we have worked to strengthen Angola’s overburdened and under-resourced health system.

HIV peer counselors in Angola

Engaging Communities in Angola

Involving vulnerable groups in their own care is key to epidemic control. Sex workers are a key population vital to ending the HIV and AIDS epidemic, but violence and discrimination are barriers to reaching that population. In Angola, our programs worked with sex workers to create a client-centered intervention focusing on finding, testing, and treating HIV. Sex workers were trained as HIV peer counselors to provide a safe, trusted source of information and counseling through the HIV testing and treatment process. Between 2017 and 2019, the project sensitized more than 24,000 female sex workers in Luanda Province.

Overview

With support from USAID, PEPFAR, and other partners, we have collaborated with the Angolan Ministry of Health to strengthen pharmaceutical supply chains; increase access to essential health commodities; establish a sustainable model for providing high-quality HIV and AIDS services; reach key populations with prevention, care, and treatment services; and improve the capacity of municipal and provincial governments to plan, fund, and supervise health programs.

Reaching key populations with prevention, care, and treatment services is critical to Angola’s fight against HIV. Weekly peer support groups for female sex workers help address structural barriers, such as gender-based violence (GBV), that put them at higher risk for HIV infection.
Under PEPFAR-funded projects, MSH teams have been employing index case testing as one strategy to reach the UNAIDS 90-90-90 targets. In index case testing, a person with confirmed HIV infection (an index case) is asked to contact family members (children, spouse, sexual partners, siblings, and parents) to invite them to be tested for HIV. Watch this webinar to learn more through three case studies from Ethiopia, Angola, and Malawi.