Today is an important day in the history of Belarus as have just signed an agreement with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria the world’s biggest donor providing grants to fight the three major killers in the world. This agreement is already the third agreement that Belarussigns with this donor, currently we are completing the first grant on HIV and entering the second phase of the grant to fight tuberculosis. Thus, since 2004, the total contribution from the Fund to Belarus amounts to 64 million dollars.

UNDP as the Principal Recipient of all the current grants and we are honoured and proud of the results that have been achieved so far for both diseases. With the assistance of the HIV grant, the national HIV programme reached remarkable results — since 2004 the percentage of HIV infected babies born to HIV infected mothers decreased from 12% to 3,4%. HIV prevalence rate among young people aged 15–24 years decreased from 28 to 12,4, the number of people infected with HIV annually remain stable. More than 1,300 HIV positive people remained alive thanks to the antiretroviral therapy provided within the grant.

What will Belarus receive as a result of the new grant on HIV? 34 thousand intravenous drug users will be covered with HIV prevention activities, 24 thousand men having sex with men and 8,5 thousand female sex workers. 50 thousand prisoners will be covered with information campaigns in prisons. Intensive work is planned with educational institutions. Around 4,000 people living with HIV will be receiving antiretroviral treatment which means they will remain alive. Christian churches of Belarus will be more actively involved in the HIV prevention and care work. One of the innovations is the creation of mechanism for social contracting when the government could contract non–governmental organisations to perform HIV prevention and care activities. This practice is being widely used in almost all European countries and in Russian Federation too. The grant’s total amount is 23,8 million EUROs for 5 years, however initial approval is provided only for the first two years, continuation of funding depends on the grant’s performance.

This grant is currently the biggest international technical assistance project in Belarus and we are proud to implement it together with the Ministry of Health. We receive a lot of support and commitment from the Minister Dr. Zharko and from the Deputy Minister Dr.Valentina Kachan who is the national coordinator of the HIV grant, I would like to praise her strong leadership and interest to implement the programme at the highest level. 

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