CPV: A cooperative agreement on Enhancing Public Health Capacity for HIV Prevention and Care Activities in Vietnam was signed by John Boardman, deputy Chief of Mission of the United States (US) Embassy to Hanoi and Nguyen Tran Hien, director of the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology (NIHE) on June 1, 2006 in Hanoi.

This new cooperative agreement between the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the NIHE, as part of the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) will continue to strengthen the eight years of co-operation between the US and the government of Vietnam in HIV prevention and care in the country.

Addressing at the ceremony, Mr. John Boardman said that the project would help the National Strategic Plan for HIV/AIDS in Vietnam over five years with three main objectives: develop national HIV laboratory capacity to support HIV testing and establish a national quality assurance and quality control system for HIV laboratories; strengthen the national HIV/AIDS surveillance system including medicine resistance surveillance, new HIV infection surveillance and AIDS indicator survey; support the Ministry of Health in implementing national action plans for surveillance and monitoring and evaluation to ensure efficiency in carrying out HIV/AIDS prevention programmes.

The signing ceremony was attended by Nguyen Huy Nga, head of the Vietnam Administration of AIDS Control (VAAC), Tran Huy Nguyen, head of the Life-Gap Project in Vietnam and Mitchell Wolfe, director of the Vietnam-based USCDC and experts and representatives from the international organisations such as World Health Organisation and United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

The project will last for five years with the financial assistance of 476,000 USD for 2006. Director of the NIHE hoped that this is a good beginning of co-operation between the NIHE and USCDC.

BL