Since its launch in 2003, the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief has saved 26 millions lives and brought the world to brink of ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030.
Now the Trump administration is pursuing a radical reimagining of PEPFAR. Officials have terminated many of its programs and withheld its funding. Rather than channel the remaining funds through non-governmental organizations to provide HIV services, U.S. financing will flow directly to partner governments. This is billed as a way to consolidate services and save money by cutting out NGO overhead costs.
Under previous administrations, PEPFAR has already put this approach in place in four Zambian provinces. For this project, journalist Andrew Green traveled to those communities to investigate how this has changed HIV services and whether this plan can still help deliver an end to the AIDS epidemic.
