HIV Equity Initiative

With the aim of achieving universal access to antiretroviral HIV treatment, in March 2007, the Liberian National AIDS & STI Control Program and Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, in partnership with Tiyatien Health, launched the HIV Equity Initiative – Liberia's first comprehensive, community-based antiretroviral treatment (ART) program – at Martha Tubman Memorial Hospital in Zwedru, Grand Gedeh County.

The HIV Equity Initiative seeks to demonstrate the impact of three unique program components on further eliminating barriers to adherence and access to ART. This involved training non-physician clinicians to prescribe and manage patients on ART; providing ART patients with comprehensive socioeconomic support including food packages and transportation stipends; and using a special type of community health worker, called “accompaniers”, to provide directly observed therapy as well as moral and psychosocial support.

Through six months of implementation, the HEI has achieved impressive results, albeit on a small-scale among ART patients receiving all interventions outlined above.

We are working to demonstrate that high quality HIV care can be achieved even in Liberia's most resource-constrained regions employing an integrated, comprehensive and community-based approach.