Technical Brief: Strengthening the Akwa Ibom Health System for Improved HIV Response

HIV & AIDS, Leadership, Management, and Governance,
Technical Briefs & Case Studies

Technical Brief: Strengthening the Akwa Ibom Health System for Improved HIV Response

Akwa Ibom ranks sixth out of Nigeria’s 36 states for the highest number of people living with HIV in the country. The 2012 National AIDS and Reproductive Health Survey showed the state as having a prevalence rate of 6.5 percent. Providing equitable services and interventions to address the HIV burden in Akwa Ibom State is a health management emergency. Adequate skills, strengthened management, and an enabling environment for service provision are critical to reducing the burden of HIV.

The Program to Build Leadership and Accountability in Nigeria’s Health System (PLAN-Health) is funded by the US Agency for International Development and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and implemented by MSH. In the first two years of the program (2010 – 2012), the focus was on Gombe State and the Federal Capital Territory. PLAN-Health selected Akwa Ibom as its third project state and began working there in 2012 to help decrease its high HIV prevalence rate and strengthen its systems to provide increased and improved health services.