PIJAAG summit on HIV: Putting the pieces together

2007 PIJAAG summit on HIV: Putting the pieces together

Pohnpei, FSM, 18 April 2007 – The Pacific Island Jurisdictions AIDS Action Group (PIJAAG) ended its three-day summit on HIV last week with a groundbreaking meeting between United States and international Pacific-based agencies working in HIV and AIDS and their country counterparts.

The theme of the conference, ‘Pacific in action: Putting the pieces together’, called on participants to strengthen their response to HIV by sharing different perspectives and strategies on HIV prevention, counselling, testing, care and treatment.

‘Seeing all the donors and partner agencies focusing on collaboration and discussing how they could coordinate their work was like a dream come true for us at a country level,’ said PIJAAG co-chair Hana Ngiruchelbad, of Palau’s Health Ministry.

The meeting was a key opportunity to increase collaboration between donors and partners and bridge the north–south divide that exists in the Pacific HIV arena.

‘We would like to learn more about what is already being done in the north to address HIV and build on that so we can then provide more appropriate technical support,’ said Dr Dennie Iniakwala, head of the HIV & STI Section at the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC). ‘We need to engage stakeholders in a process of partnerships to address HIV, because each sub-region in the Pacific has different needs.’

Initial discussions focused on regional initiatives, with particular emphasis on increasing the support of agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control for the Pacific Regional Strategy on HIV.

People living with HIV played a pivotal role throughout the summit. Sessions were strongly led by country participants and provided an ideal setting in which to share the experiences and challenges of implementing HIV programmes in their Pacific Island countries and territories.

PIJAAG is comprised of the six Pacific US-affiliated countries and territories: Palau, Guam, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Republic of the Marshall Islands and American Samoa.

Participants involved in the summit came from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the US Office of Minority Health, the Asian and Pacific Islander American Health Forum, the Asian Pacific Islander Wellness Center, Hawaii’s Life Foundation, the AIDS Education Training Centre, PIJAAG, the AusAID-funded Pacific Regional HIV/AIDS Project, UNFPA, the Pacific Islands AIDS Foundation and SPC.

ENDS

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