Ghana, WHO employ Differentiated Services Delivery for HIV patients
In Ghana, a new focus on Differentiated Service Delivery (DSD) for people with HIV aims at adapting health services in person-centred ways without overburdening the health system.
The Ghana HIV programme has advanced in reaching more people, but there are still large treatment gaps. Nationwide some 40% of people with HIV have not started lifesaving ART indicating the need to improve linkage from testing service to treatment service. Nevertheless for the majority people on treatment which is about 79%, their virus is suppressed, indicating programme strength in supporting adherence to ART.
In 2019, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (the Global Fund) together with the World Health Organisation (WHO) introduced the Differentiated Service Delivery Strategic Initiative (DSD SI), which made technical assistance for rapid scale-up of DSD approaches available in Ghana and 9 other countries. The Initiative was designed to accelerate the adoption of WHO-recommended DSD approaches within Global Fund supported programmes.
WHO coordinated country level dialogues that engaged governments as well as implementing and civil society partners in the development of DSD technical assistance workplans. “The DSD SI is an important tool for making differentiated approaches for HIV testing, diagnosis and treatment accessible in the 10 countries,” said Dr Meg Doherty, Director of WHO Global HIV, Hepatitis and STI Programmes. “It is helping to jump-start national programmes, including Ghana’s, to deliver person-centred HIV services at scale.” she added.
With differentiated service delivery more people will have access to convenient person-centred health services.
WHO/S.S
