The National Empowerment Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS in Kenya (NEPHAK) has written a communique urging the Government of the United States to expand the 90-day limited waiver for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) Programme.
In a statement on Sunday, February 16, NEPHAK said that the extension of the waiver would allow beneficiaries to execute a responsible phased transition plan for beneficiary countries to adopt.
"As you work in re-evaluating and re-aligning United States support, consider expanding the limited waiver that provides for a responsible phased transition plan for beneficiary countries to work with," the communique appealed.
"The waiver should include an inbuilt accountability mechanism to enable empowered recipients of care to play an active and meaningful role and provide feedback on the quality of services being provided."
Just hours after taking over the presidency, Trump ordered a 90-day pause in the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), a move that affected countries benefiting from the aid, including Africa, and led to the suspension of 54,000 healthcare workers in Kenya.
However, following the announcement of the waiver earlier this month, workers under PEPFAR, a program under USAID, were allowed to continue working.
The waiver temporarily restored its HIV/AIDS initiative, which supports life-saving HIV care and treatment as well as the prevention of mother-to-child transmission services, and HIV care and treatment services for all populations and people living with HIV.
NEPHAK, however, urged the county and national governments to absorb healthcare workers including doctors and clinicians who have been affected by the United States stop-work order to reinforce the country's capacity of Human Resources for Health (HRH).
"Allocate resources and put in place a phased plan to absorb health care workers rendered jobless by the US government pause order," it stated.
NEPHAK has further urged the national government to allocate resources from the current supplementary budget for the procurement and distribution of ARVs and TB medicines for eligible populations.
"Ensure that commodities and supplies needed to prevent, treat, and manage TB and HIV are available predictably and sustainably to support the up-scaling of multi-month ARV issuance as required by the DSD strategy," it said.
Furthermore, NEPHAK has called for the inclusion of HIV and TB treatment and care in SHIF in addition to designating the HIV and Non-Communicable Diseases as priority beneficiaries of Critical and Chronic Illnesses Funds.
NEPHAK has further stressed the need for the county governments to increase resource allocations to support the delivery of HIV, TB, and other health services.
It has further stressed the need for county governments to collaborate with the Ministry of Health and other HIV agencies to train and sensitize healthcare workers on HIV service delivery and related human rights.
