Ministry of Health Partnerships

CDC works in partnership with ministries of health (MOHs) to help them increase their capacity for leading and managing HIV/AIDS programs.

CDC partnerships are based on mutual respect, joint mission, and a shared long-term vision of sustainable institutional capacity. CDC supports this approach in a coordinated and complementary manner by bringing knowledge gained from U.S. and global public health science and practice to the international community. CDC works with MOHs to establish an integrated and comprehensive approach to epidemiology, surveillance, health management information systems, and laboratory systems that span multiple diseases. To accomplish this, CDC focuses on a systems-wide approach that:

Provides direct technical assistance to MOHs at their headquarters, in the field, and through the hiring and on-the-job mentoring of locally employed staff.
Builds public health infrastructure and strengthens health information systems at national, provincial, and district levels for data-driven decision-making.
Helps MOHs implement evidence-based prevention and treatment programs.
Establishes the evidence base that supports program implementation.
Trains public health practitioners and leaders.

Notable Accomplishments

CDC’s accomplishments in building sustainable HIV/AIDS programs include supporting MOHs and indigenous partners in over 75 countries through:

Cooperative agreements with MOHs, other host government organizations, and local universities.
Technical assistance from U.S. and overseas staff, with offices in 41 countries.
Collaborations with other CDC global health programs to support sustainable capacity by training local public health professionals in laboratory science and program management.
- Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Training Program to establish laboratory-based surveillance systems for priority diseases with an enhanced laboratorian capacity to assist in outbreak response.
- Sustainable Management Development Program (SMDP) to improve public health leadership and management in the host country.
Provision of technical expertise and financial support to the World Health Organization to strengthen its work with MOHs on multiple components of HIV/AIDS programs such as blood safety, injection safety, counseling and testing, male circumcision, TB/HIV integration, mother-to-child transmission, health systems strengthening, strategic information, and laboratory capacity-building.