Ghana

With an HIV prevalence rate of 1.9%, Ghana has so far avoided the impact of a full blown national HIV and AIDS emergency.  But the situation remains critical.  The infection rate is increasing among young people, and without greater HIV prevention and treatment efforts, HIV and AIDS prevalence could grow dramatically and rapidly.

In Ghana there are currently an estimated 260,000 people living with HIV: 150,000 are women and 10,000 are children under the age of 15.¹ While there are currently more than 13,000 HIV positive people on antiretroviral therapy (ART), it is estimated that 87,000 people are still in need of access to medication.² The Ghanaian government is strongly committed to domestic development and addressing the AIDS epidemic and has done an excellent job of capacity building over the past 20 years. In addition civil society and the NGO sector in particular, are very active in the implementation and support of programs.

Overview of Ghana Grant

The Global Fund (RED) grant in Ghana is designed to scale up HIV and AIDS services in Ghana to fifteen district hospitals in high HIV prevalence areas and focuses on scaling up voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), prevention of mother-to-child transmission services and treatment for sexually transmitted infections. The program is also working to increase treatment of opportunistic infections and to integrate HIV and tuberculosis (TB) services, as TB is a common HIV co-infection and often requires treatment in parallel with HIV treatment.

(RED) money in Ghana supports programs which have already:

• Provided antiretroviral therapy to more than 26,000 people
• Provided preventative antiretroviral therapy to over 8,000 HIV-positive pregnant women to reduce the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV
• Enabled over 646,000 people to complete the HIV testing and counseling process
• Enabled testing and counseling of over 480,000 pregnant women
• Trained 1600 HIV testing counselors and 1400 prevention of mother-to-child transmission counselors
• Established and supported 500 centers to reduce the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV
• Prepared 105 service delivery points to provide antiretroviral therapy
• Prepared 101 laboratories with the capacity to monitor antiretroviral therapy
• Trained 477 service deliverers in clinical management of people living with HIV
• Reached over 23,000 HIV positive patients with home-based care