The HIV Coverage, Quality, and Impact Network (CQUIN) is a multi-country learning network designed to accelerate the implementation of high-quality differentiated service delivery for HIV. CQUIN’s goal is to increase the number of people living with HIV initiating and sustaining highly effective HIV treatment with sustained viral suppression.

Find out more at cquin.icap.columbia.edu

ICAP is collaborating with the Centre for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ) to conduct an evaluation to generate information about HIV prevalence among general and key populations. This information will be used to estimate HIV incidence and provide information about access to health services. (funded by the CDC)

ICAP is conducting a formative evaluation of HIV self-testing among adolescent girls and young women in Zambia.

ICAP is examining the feasibility and impact of implementing an “enhanced” model of integration activities for improving access to and uptake of contraceptive methods compared to the current standard of care. (funded by PEPFAR through the CDC)

This project will strengthen HIV rapid testing quality assurance efforts by developing guidelines, indicators, and tools for implementing and monitoring retesting procedures for HIV positive individuals prior to ART initiation. (funded by PEPFAR through the CDC)

Optimizing Momentum Toward Sustainable Epidemic Control (OpCon) is a global initiative led by ICAP at Columbia University and funded by PEPFAR through HRSA.

OpCon can assist countries in addressing the challenges they face in reaching epidemic control, sustaining achievements, and exploring innovations to measure progress.

ICAP provided technical assistance to Zambia’s Ministry of Health to conduct the Zambia Population-Based HIV Impact Assessment (ZAMPHIA) survey, which assessed HIV prevalence, incidence, and access to HIV prevention, care, and treatment services. The survey comprised household-based interviews and HIV counseling and testing services for adults and children. Conducted between October 2015 and August 2016, the survey found that HIV incidence, 0.66 percent (ages 15 to 64), is lower than previously estimated. Compared to the 2003 incidence estimates between 1.3 and 1.5 percent per year, the current rate of new HIV infections has been cut in half during the past 13 years, when effective HIV treatment became available in sub-Saharan Africa, largely through support from PEPFAR.

Find out more at phia.icap.columbia.edu

Through the Quality Improvement Capacity for Impact Project (QICIP), ICAP provides ministries of health and local partners with technical assistance that enables them to monitor program performance, identify quality challenges, explore root causes, develop targeted interventions, and conduct rapid, iterative tests of change in programs supported by PEPFAR.

This five-year cooperative agreement is funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA).

The Global Nurse Capacity Building Program (GNCBP) is a global health initiative that was administered by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), under the U.S Department of Health and Human Services, with funding from the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). It was implemented by ICAP at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health (ICAP) from 2009 to 2018. GNCBP’s goal was to advance the HIV response toward epidemic control and to improve population health in sub-Saharan Africa by fostering individuals, institutions, and networks to expand, enhance, and sustain the nursing and midwifery workforce.

The program used a holistic approach to strengthen nursing and midwifery education and practice through two complementary sub-projects: the Nursing Education Partnership Initiative (NEPI), which expanded the health workforce by producing new nurses and midwives; and the General Nursing (GN) project, which supported the maintenance of a skilled health workforce through continuing professional development (CPD), in support of HIV care and treatment scale up and sustainability. Together, NEPI and GN interventions increased the quantity and quality of the nursing and midwifery workforce by addressing seven domains of health workforce development: infrastructure; curriculum; faculty; clinical skills; production; in-service training; and partnership for policy and regulation.

Find the GNCBP final report here

Find out more about NEPI

The MTCT-Plus Initiative, the world’s first multi-country HIV treatment program, aimed to demonstrate to a disbelieving world that it was possible to provide care and antiretroviral (ARV) treatment in resource-limited settings, using programs to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) as an entry point.

In December 2003, the MTCT-Plus Secretariat in New York (the precursor to ICAP, headed by ICAP’s Wafaa El-Sadr and Elaine Abrams) received its first grant from the new President’s Emergency Program For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).

Four years later, the MTCT-Plus Initiative of Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health was providing HIV care and treatment for nearly 17,000 people at 14 sites in nine countries. MTCT-Plus received expansion funding from USAID in 2003 and 2006. By 2010, ICAP had provided HIV care and treatment to more than one million people.

Find the MTCT-Plus and MTCT-Plus Expansion reports here.

In September 2002, the Mailman School of Public Health (MSPH) at Columbia University (CU) entered into a Cooperative Agreement with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for the University Technical Assistance Projects (UTAP) in Support of the Global HIV/AIDS Program. Situated within ICAP, UTAP was originally envisioned as a single-country program for the provision of technical assistance, but rapidly grew to include long-term and short-term technical and administrative assistance to the national responses to HIV/AIDS in five countries: Mozambique, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia.

As the original UTAP project drew to a close and PEPFAR moved into its second phase—focused on sustainability—ICAP entered into several, follow-on Cooperative Agreements, called UTAP-2. Four were country-focused (in Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Swaziland, and Tanzania) and the fifth—UTAP-2 Atlanta—became a flexible mechanism for providing a wide range of technical assistance and other support to PEPFAR countries. After beginning in 2009 as a means to help CDC conduct surveillance training more efficiently through distance education, UTAP-2 Atlanta grew over the next six and a half years to comprise 11 distinct projects addressing needs and gaps in the HIV response and answering important research questions to inform the response going forward.

Find all UTAP and UTAP-2 resources here.