Last modified: Monday, November 19, 2007
$60 Million USAID grant goes to Indiana and Moi universities' AMPATH program to combat AIDS in Kenya
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Nov. 19, 2007
INDIANAPOLIS -- AMPATH, a program that grew out of the partnership between Indiana University School of Medicine and the Moi (Kenya) University Teaching and Referral Hospital, has received a 5-year, $60-million grant to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS in Kenya. In addition, the IU School of Medicine will augment this with $6 million over the 5 years of the grant.
Photo by: Tyagan Miller
AMPATH staffers harvest produce for HIV patients and their families in Kenya.
The principal investigator of the grant, Robert Einterz, M.D., is associate dean for international affairs at the IU School of Medicine and co-founder of the IU-Moi partnership and AMPATH. He will coordinate all the activities between IU School of Medicine, the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital, Moi University School of Medicine and other U.S. partners and universities collaborating in the project.
"USAID made the grant to the AMPATH program because of its success in developing and implementing treatment and prevention programs in Kenya for the past decade," said Henrietta H. Fore, the administrator of USAID, director of foreign assistance and undersecretary for management. "Through President Bush's PEPFAR program, we are making resources available in countries with a substantial HIV/AIDS burden. These resources include support for prevention efforts, care and support, and treatment for affected patients," she said.
PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, which is a 5-year, $15 billion program initiated in 2003, has treated over a million HIV-positive people in 15 focus countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and the Caribbean. Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.) is sponsoring legislation to renew PEPFAR at President Bush's requested increase of $30 billion over the next 5 years.
AMPATH currently provides care for 52,000 HIV-infected patients and has reduced the rate of infection significantly. With this agreement, the goal is to expand the program to provide care to an additional 150,000 Kenyans with HIV by 2012, of which at least 70,000 will be on antiretroviral drugs, and to interrupt the transmission of HIV through home-based counseling and testing in communities served by 19 facilities. In addition, the partnership intends to improve and expand control of tuberculosis, and assist and engage communities and families to meet the basic needs of 20,000 orphans and vulnerable children within the first 2 years of the grant.
"I am proud that our government is making such a dramatic commitment to saving the lives of people suffering from HIV/AIDS," said Dr. Einterz, M.D. "As a Hoosier, I am proud that IU has taken a leadership role in caring for our African neighbors with HIV. This grant supports our core services to treat HIV patients.
"Now, along with our Kenyan partners, we look forward to moving beyond this grant to pursue our groundbreaking mission of home-based counseling and testing, and expand beyond HIV to tackle maternal and infant mortality."
The PEPFAR target in Kenya is to have 250,000 Kenyans on antiretroviral therapy by Sept. 30, 2009. The target for infections averted in the same timeframe through the prevention of mother-to-child transmission programs and other prevention efforts is 425,000. By September 2009, 450,000 orphans and vulnerable children and 250,000 people living with AIDS will be receiving palliative care in Kenya.
The grant was announced in Nairobi on Nov. 19 during a signing ceremony in the Ministry of Health Headquarters attended by Administrator Fore; Dr. Einterz, U.S. Ambassador to Kenya Michael E. Ranneberger; AA/AFR Katherine J. Almquist; USAID/Kenya Mission Director Erna Kerst; Joe Mamlin, M.D., IU professor emeritus and co-founder of the IU-Moi Partnership; and, Moi University and USAID administrators and staff members.
For more information on AMPATH, please see www.medicine.iupui.edu/kenya
