Pretoria - South Africa has received a major boost from the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and malaria.
Health Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi announced on Sunday that the Global Fund to fight Aids, TB and Malaria's Board of Directors have approved $302 million for South Africa, over a period of five years, for prevention, treatment and care of Aids and TB.
Motsoaledi said the fund will allow the country to put more people on early treatment, improve health outcomes as well as avert Aids-related deaths.
"Of the previous grants we have received from the Global Fund, this is the highest amount. It covers, for the first time treatment and also includes health systems strengthening and scaling up of medical male circumcisions," Motsoaledi said.
Of the $302 million, $196 million is for Aids medication, $33 million for medical male circumcision, and $10 million for strengthening health systems and community response programmes to HIV/Aids and TB, and $8 million is for direct support of TB programmes.
A sum of $128 million - 65 percent of which is for antiretroviral therapy (ART) - has been approved for the next two years.
The fund would be used to support priority areas, including:
* Increasing HIV and TB case finding and linkages to care at community level through HIV Counselling and Testing
* Rapid roll out of safe medical male circumcision targeting underserved, high burden areas
* Expanding access to ART according to updated national guidelines and Ionized Prophylaxis Therapy
* Strengthen pharmacovigilance and resistance monitoring and reduce adverse events related to ART, TB and related medicines
* Strengthen health systems supporting HIV and Aids, and government's and civil society capacity to manage the response to HIV and Aids
Dr Motsoaledi noted that this was a major addition to the department's R4.280 billion tender for procurement of antiretroviral drugs to support the implementation of HIV and Aids treatment in South Africa for the next two years.
