Examples of organizations with whom we have ongoing relationships are:
- The US Government including;
- OGAC (Office of the US Global AIDS Coordinator)
- USAID (US Agency for International Development)
- CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
- PEPFAR Track 1 Partners (Columbia University - International Center for AIDS Care and Treatment Programs (CU), Catholic Relief Services/AIDS Relief (CRS), Harvard University– School of Public Health, University of Maryland and The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation)
- DOD (Department of Defense)
- GFATM (The Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria)
- UNAIDS
- UNITAIDS
- World Bank
- WHO (World Health Organization)
- CHAI (Clinton HIV/AIDS Health Access initiative)
- The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
- UNICEF (The United Nations Children's Fund)
- EPN (Ecumenical Pharmaceutical Network)
- NGOs (Non Governmental Organizations, including faith-based drug supply organizations – DSOs –) i.e. World Vision, Mission for Essential Drugs and Supplies (MEDS), Christian Health Association of Zambia (CHAZ), Christian Health Association of Nigeria CHAN/CHANPharm
- Department For International Development, UK (DFID)
- Global Drug Facility
Collaboration take many different forms; from sharing information and data to coordinating activities and plans to implementing common projects. Particularly important is work on new prevention initiatives such as Early Infant Diagnosis (EID), Male Circumcision and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (prep). Below are some examples of past and ongoing collaborations between SCMS and key stakeholders.
Donors work together to improve procurement planning
Coordinated procurement planning by donors and governments is critical for an uninterrupted supply of essential medicines and other health commodities. In June 2006, the Global Fund, World Bank and the US government made a commitment to coordinate national level ARVs procurement plans, starting in Ethiopia, Guyana, Haiti, Mozambique, Rwanda and Vietnam. This Coordinated Procurement Planning initiative built on existing systems and mechanisms under country leadership to develop a robust approach to country coordination. SCMS serves as CPP technical secretariat, facilitating the operations of the procurement working group. As a major donor of HIV/AIDS commodities, UNITAID has recently joined the initiative as has WHO. The initiative is now refocusing on international level coordination between the donors and major procurement and supply management organizations. To support this international focus SCMS is working with CHAI, Global Fund and UNICEF to identify funding gaps and other supply challenges to support the donors’ objectives. The most immediate focus is on the risk of ARV stockout, but we expect to move on to include other key HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB commodities.
Public-private partnership to address treatment needs of children with HIV/AIDS
Children with HIV/AIDS have needs and face challenges different than adults. Responding to a call for action by Mrs Laura Bush when she was the First Lady, and under the leadership of the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator, the US government, pharmaceutical companies, UNAIDS, UNICEF, WHO, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation and the Clinton Foundation have developed the Pediatric AIDS Public-Private Partnership to address the unique treatment needs of children with HIV/AIDS. SCMS developed of a standardized procedure to generate a replicable forecast and prepared a selective forecast of pediatric ARV demand for 2007 and 2008 in 11 of the PEPFAR focus countries plus Zimbabwe. SCMS is working to test new ways to speed-up the registration of new pediatric products by drug regulatory authorities in developing countries under an initiative known as Pre-Approval Access to Therapies for HIV/AIDS (PaATH).
WHO/UNAIDS working group on antiretroviral forecasting for global demand
SCMS is a member of this working group which develops antiretroviral (ARV) forecasts based on different methods and consolidates resulting forecasts of ARV demand from: WHO and UNAIDS's Annual Survey of Demand, the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), and from SCMS's own forecasts for PEPFAR. The objective of the working group is to prepare global forecasts of demand that can be shared with the major manufacturers of ARVs - innovator and generic ARV - and Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) producers to assist suppliers in their estimates of demand and investment plans to ensure that adequate manufacturing capacity is in place as programs scale up..
AIDS Medicines and Diagnostic Services (AMDS) Network to support procurement and supply chain management of HIV commodities
SCMS is a member of the AMDS network housed in the Strategic Information Division of the WHO AIDS Department. The goal of the network is to collate and provide information and tools that support the consistent supply of commodities for the prevention, treatment and care of HIV/AIDS. In addition to working closely with WHO to support the work of AMDS, SCMS provides procurement data for the WHO Global Price Reporting Mechanism, ARV registration status information for the WHO regulatory database and supports other AMDS initiatives and activities including the Procurement and Supply Management (PSM) tool box, development of key indicators for the monitoring and evaluation of PSM systems.
SCMS is a procurement agent for the Global Fund Principal Recipients in Côte d’Ivoire and Ethiopia
SCMS and the Global Fund’s collaboration has been key to ensure a continuous availability of HIV/AIDS related commodities at national level. In Côte d’Ivoire, since 2007 SCMS has worked closely with the Global Fund to meet the national need in Cote d'Ivoire. With the support of PEPFAR and USAID, in 2007/8 SCMS responded quickly to Global Fund needs; preventing stockouts and managing the pipeline of orders to address the expansion of new patients into the treatment program. In Ethiopia, SCMS supported the development a six- year national forecast for all essential HIV/AIDS commodities that has been used for Ethiopia’s Global Fund Round 7 application. The results of the quantification were also used to procure a one-year supply of HIV rapid test kits through SCMS with funding from the Global Fund.
Working closely with Track 1.0 to meet scale-up targets of treatment and care programs
On behalf of PEPFAR, the Track 1.0 programs’ mission is to fast-track initiation of ART in the focus countries to meet scale-up targets of treatment and care programs. The Track 1.0 partners include Harvard University School of Public Health, Columbia University International Center for AIDS Care and Treatment Programs, The Elizabeth Glazer Pediatric AIDS Foundation, and Catholic Relief Services. PSCM has partnered with these programs in several PEPFAR focus countries including: Zambia, Côte d’ Ivoire and Tanzania to aggregate ARV forecasting and in procurement. SCMS procures ARVs, OIs and laboratory products under IQC contracts which allow these programs to utilize all of PSCM’s services outside of country specific USG funding.
SCMS collaborates with CHAI and USAID | DELIVER on the development of a Laboratory Quantification Tool
To support the growing numbers of patients on anti-retroviral treatment the need for laboratory commodities has rapidly increased. However, inadequate lab supply chains and tools for forecasting lab equipment have led to inadequate data and made planning and scale-up difficult. In October 2007, SCMS and the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) signed a memorandum of understanding to develop a new laboratory forecasting tool using Microsoft Excel. Representatives from SCMS, USAID | DELIVER PROJECT and CHAI assessed various tools and agreed to develop a new tool with the following characteristics:
- Flexible – can accommodate multiple types of morbidity data
- Easy to use – should not be complicated in its layout and presentation
- Capacity building – can be used in the field for trainings exercises
- Robust – should be able to take into account as much detail as possible
CHAI undertook the development of the tool addressing the following areas: CD4 tests, hematology, clinical chemistry, viral load and early infant diagnosis—commodities that account for about 80 percent of lab commodities procured by SCMS.
The tool is being rolled out by each partner. The ultimate aim is that SCMS, CHAI and USAID | DELIVER PROJECT will continue to share the tool with others, including government agencies and PEPFAR implementing and Track 1.0 partners.
SCMS joins Delivery Working Group of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation supported initiative to research potential of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis The Gates Foundation is providing substantial funding to support the development of new prevention technologies, including Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis – the use of anti-retroviral drugs by HIV negative individuals in highly at risk communities to prevent the transmission of the HIV virus. Based on our experience in developing the SCMS international supply chain SCSM is to co-chair the Delivery Working Group of the PrEP project to address the issues of making the products available in a timely manner should the current (2010) research projects establish that PrEP is effective and donors support the funding of a substantive international program of PrEP. |
