Catalyzing Expanded Access to Early Testing, Care and Treatment among HIV-Exposed Infants

Overview

This Unitaid-funded project aims to increase access to early infant HIV diagnosis (EID) and antiretroviral treatment among eligible children. The project’s two main objectives are to optimize EID networks through the introduction of point-of-care (POC) diagnostic technology to increase the number of infants tested and initiated on ART, and create a market for affordable, effective, and equitable HIV testing of exposed infants. EGPAF worked closely with CIDRZ to provide technical assistance on a research project that served as both a lab and field evaluation whose ultimate goal of registering the POC EID machines with the Government of Zambia was achieved in 2018. This will accommodate Zambian regulations and allow the project to use the new technology while identifying factors that will enable nation-wide scale-up of EID.