These operational guidelines provide detailed information about how to use the indicator assessment tool. This tool assesses the extent to which indicators intended for use in the HIV response meet a set of internationally agreed standards. These operational guidelines, the indicator assessment tool and the standards have all been produced by the UNAIDS Monitoring and Evaluation Reference Group (MERG).

Although much has been written on HIV-sensitive social protection, there is insufficient guidance on how to bring to scale what works in the context of different HIV epidemics and for different populations. This document seeks to fill this gap. It provides guidance to governments, people living with, at risk of or affected by HIV, policy-makers, and other stakeholders on how to intensify the integration of HIV with social protection and other programmes for ending poverty and inequality towards ending AIDS. It summarizes relevant evidence on social protection, including cash transfers, and on how social protection contributes to the AIDS response. It presents a brief account of the status of progress of Member States in meeting the HIV and social protection target of the 2016 Political Declaration on AIDS. It provides guidance for leveraging and scaling up social protection—in particular, social safety nets, financial incentives and social services—towards achieving the goal of ending AIDS. It does not focus on social security and labour market polices.

This document offers guidance on why and how efforts to Fast-Track HIV prevention, testing and treatment services can and should be grounded in human rights. Beyond being an imperative in themselves, human rights principles and approaches are critical to addressing barriers to HIV services and to achieving HIV targets. Human rights principles and approaches will help maximize the reach and impact of HIV prevention, testing and treatment programmes. They also will help address potential human rights challenges and prevent abuses that may occur in the context of urgent efforts to Fast- Track the achievement of HIV prevention, testing and treatment targets.

The primary purpose of antiretroviral therapy is to keep people living with HIV in good health. In the large majority of people living with HIV, antiretroviral medication can be chosen that reduce the amount of HIV in the blood to levels that are undetectable by standard laboratory tests. 

The old saying “What gets measured gets done” may be a cliché, but is still very true for the response to HIV. Over the years, a detailed understanding of the HIV epidemic has emerged through the collection, analysis and dissemination of data, helping programmes to reach the right people in the right place and at the right time. Having high-quality data on the AIDS response has enabled ambitious, measurable and time-bound targets to be set for tracking progress and ensuring accountability.

In this report, UNAIDS is announcing that 18.2 million people now have access to HIV treatment. The Fast-Track response is working. Increasing treatment coverage is reducing AIDS-related deaths among adults and children. But the life-cycle approach has to include more than just treatment. Tuberculosis (TB) remains among the commonest causes of illness and death among people living with HIV of all ages, causing about one third of AIDS-related deaths in 2015. These deaths could and should have been prevented. Download slide deck

Based on privacy, confidentiality and security principles an Assessment Tool was developed to assess in country the extent that the confidentiality and security of personal health information is protected at facility and data warehouse/repository levels and whether national guidelines exist including privacy laws. A Manual on the use of the Assessment Tool has been produced and is available below. 

Download the User’s Manual for the paper-based version

Download the electronic Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment Manual and  Tool

Download the paper-based Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment Tool

With scaling-up of HIV and other health services in low- and middle-income countries, an increasing amount of personally identifiable health information is being collected at health facilities and stored in data repositories at local, regional and national levels. Countries need to protect the confidentiality and security of identifiable and de-identified personal health information, and this can be accomplished in part through the existence and implementation of relevant privacy laws, policies and programmes.

Based on these requirements a paper-based and electronic Assessment Tool have been developed to assess the existence and implementation of national country laws, policies and programmes on protecting the confidentiality and security of personal health information collected and held at the facility, data warehouse and national policy levels. The UNAIDS/PEPFAR Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment Tool provides guidance for countries to facilitate, where required, the assessment of the security of the collection, storage and use of data in order to maintain privacy, confidentiality and security.

Provided below are instructions on how to download and set up the paper-based and electronic Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment tool.  

Download the paper-based Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment Tool

Download the electronic Privacy, Confidentiality and Security Assessment Manual and  Tool

Download the User’s Manual for the paper-based version