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Introduction to the Joint Learning Initiative on Children and HIV/AIDS (JLICA)
Children are emerging as the next frontier in the global effort to overcome the HIV/AIDS pandemic. New policies and programmes are required to provide paediatric AIDS treatment, measures are needed to protect vulnerable children and their caregivers, and universal access to health, education and social protection is required to mitigate the effects of deepening poverty on children’s health and wellbeing. Treatment, care and support must be linked to prevention for any hope of achieving a future AIDS-free generation. A concerted effort to crystallise existing experience and push forward the frontiers of knowledge must focus global attention on these issues and shape responses in the coming decade. How did JLICA start?
JLICA was initiated by Lincoln Chen, who was at the forefront of the Joint Learning initiative on Human Resources for Health. (http://www.globalhealthtrust.org/indexjli.html),. The founding partners of the Initiative include the Global Equity Initiative at Harvard University, Francois-Xavier Bagnoud International, UNICEF, Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights at the Harvard School of Public Health, the Bernard van Leer Foundation, and the Human Sciences Research Council. Where is JLICA situated?
JLICA is led by two co-chairs, Peter Bell and Agnes Binagwaho, and governed by a steering committee. Peter Bell is a visiting fellow at the Carter Centre and a Visiting Professor at the Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University. Agnes Binagwaho is executive secretary of Rwanda’s National Commission to Fight AIDS; she is also a member of the expert panel of the Country Coordinating Mechanism in Rwanda for the Global Fund, the National Steering Committee on Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV, and the Technical Advisory Group for HIV/AIDS in the Ministry of Health. A secretariat, staffed by Drs Alec Irwin and Alayne Adams, is housed at the François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard School of Public Health in the United States, and François-Xavier Bagnoud International in Geneva. For more information on JLICA visit www.jlica.org Why is JLICA important?
The Initiative engages scholars, practioners, and policymakers in collaborative problem-solving research and analysis to address children in the context of HIV and AIDS. Its goal is to fulfill and protect the rights of children affected by HIV/AIDS by mobilising scientific and programmatic evidence and by producing actionable recommendations for effective policy and practice. JLICA is a global, cross-sectoral, interdisciplinary exercise in collaboration between policymakers, practioners, scholars and people directly affected by the epidemic. Its research tasks range across child survival, caregiving for children affected by AIDS, essential services, costing of responses, and issues of rights and governance. It is positioned at the interface between politics and programming, and between technical expertise and political prioritisation. The goals of the JLICA
The objectives of JLICA are as follows: - Mobilising and generating evidence:
JLICA gathers and assesses scientific evidence on operational, political and public policy issues related to children and HIV/AIDS, as well as documenting experiential knowledge emerging from communities of practice. - Expanding space for new thinking:
JLICA engenders multi-disciplinary and inter-sectoral interaction and synthesis that stimulates innovative thinking and problem solving, while engaging new expertise. - Facilitating linkages:
Although many groups are engaged with issues of HIV/AIDS and children, there is insufficient communication across disciplines and between communities of knowledge. Knowledge generated from research on the one hand, and policy and practice on the other, must be linked more closely. The HIV/AIDS field can also learn from other bodies of knowledge and practice. JLICA will function to connect people, ideas and sectors. - Advancing action:
JLICA brings practitioners, policymakers and scholars together to examine evidence and forge consensus on what needs to be done, how and by whom. This includes developing recommendations, prioritising responses, and advocating action.
How will the JLICA do its work?
The JLICA was formally launched in October 2006 at a meeting at Foxhills in London. The Initiative is expected to continue until the end of 2008. The aim of the Initiative is to compile and disseminate research, policy, programme and operational knowledge and advocate for its implementation. This is being done by four thematic learning groups whose focus comes from the 2004 Framework for the Protection, Care and Support of Orphans and Vulnerable Children Living in a World with HIV and AIDS. In addition to the thematic learning groups, there will be several cross-cutting topics. Each learning group is co-ordinated by two co-chairs and includes a core of approximately 10-15 practioners, policymakers and scholars, together with reference groups and advisors working in a consultative capacity. The four Learning Groups are:
Learning Group 1: Strethening Families – co-chaired by Linda Richter (Human Sciences Research Council, South Africa) and Angela Wahkweya (Family Health International, United States). Learning Group 2: Community Action – co-chaired by Geoff Foster (Family AIDS Caring Trust, Zimbabwe) and Madhu Deshmukh, (CARE USA, United States). Learning Group 3: Access to Services and Human Rights – co-chaired by Jim Kim (François-Xavier Bagnoud Professor of Health and Human Rights at the Harvard School of Public Health and Professor of Medicine and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School, United States) and Lydia Mungerera (The AIDS Support Organization, Uganda). Learning Group 4: Social and Economic Policies – co-chaired by Alex de Waal (Social Science Research Council, United States) and Masuma Mamdani (Research on Poverty Alleviation, Tanzania)
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