Pact inked for PLHIVs in AIDS Summit launch

CEBU, Philippines - The mayors of the neighboring cities of Cebu, Lapu-Lapu and Mandaue yesterday signed an agreement with the Department of Health-7 to come up with a network that provides care and support to People Living with HIV (PLHIVs).

The memorandum of understanding was entered into during the launching of the first ever Central Visayas Regional AIDS Summit at the Sarrosa International Hotel in Cebu City.

DOH-7 also transferred to social hygiene clinics in the three cities a performance-based grant from the department. A social hygiene clinic from Cebu City got P1 million; P500,000 for another clinic in Lapu-Lapu; and another P500,000 for a clinic in Mandaue City.

On the signing of the MOU, DOH-7 Director Jaime Bernadas said they “(recognized) the importance of providing a continuum of treatment, care and support services to adequately meet their needs, the Cebu tri-city prioritized the establishment and operationalization of an HIV Service Delivery Network (SDN).”

“This (SDN) for PLHIV aims to provide a platform for the delivery of comprehensive package of services (including health and related non-health services) by formally binding together various referral services, strengthening two-way referral mechanisms between agencies and providing the venue for these organizations to meet regularly,” he said, in a prepared message attached to the SDN operational guidelines.

The purpose of the network, Bernadas said in the same message, is to “review delivery of services, discuss and further strengthen the peripheral and coordination mechanisms” in attending to PLHIVs.

Bernadas said HIV prevalence in the cities of Cebu, Lapu-Lapu, and Mandaue has substantially increased in the last five years with the rate of infection accelerating among people who inject drugs and men having sex with other men.

Aside from DOH-7 and the local government units and their respective social welfare departments, Cebu PLUS Association, Eversley Child Sanitarium, Regional Rehabilitation Center for Youth, Society of the Divine Word-University of San Carlos, Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center, and the Department of Social Welfare and Development-7 also signed the MOU.

These offices pledged to work together to deliver critical, accessible, and quality medical care community support, and home care services to people affected by HIV.

It was agreed that the DOH-7 director, with the Cebu City Health Department director as vice chairperson, would lead the SDN.

Each SDN member would focus on PLHIVs and accepted the role and responsibility to support the development of more detailed operational plans and to enhance the PLHIVs’ access to the network’s services.

They also agreed on exchanging information and documentation as evaluation and preparation of case studies of SDN for PLHIV.

Technically, they also agreed to collaborate with co-members in developing new referral mechanisms and innovative strategies in delivering services to PLHIVs.

SDN would ensure that each agency must select appropriate participants to its meetings and other activities.  (FREEMAN)