The Government’s efforts to stop HIV in children and provide treatment, care and support to HIV-infected children are supported by UNDP/GF HIV Project "Continuing scale up of the response to HIV in Uzbekistan, with particular focus on most at risk populations and strengthening system and capacity for universal access to HIV prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care in Uzbekistan".

UNICEF as one of the Project sub-recipients, responsible for implementation of the sub-project on capacity strengthening, aimed to contribute to scaling up of activities on prevention of mother to child transmission and pediatric AIDS services, undertakes activities on training of medical specialists. Back in 2011 about 400 medical specialists from all of the regions in the country were trained on these issues. Trainings of trainers from all across the country in May 2012 continued this initiative.

The trainings were highly attended by Doctors of different qualifications – pediatricians, neonatologists, infectionists, specialists of maternity hospital and AIDS centers. Dr. Saida Pazilova, the trainer noted: “It is great that so many medical specialists from various specializations and from all regions of the country attended the training. This enables sharing experiences and raising questions from different medical perspectives. After the completion of the trainings the doctors have greater awareness of HIV and its prevalence which in its turn will allows to better understand importance of counseling and testing, aimed at timely starting treatment to securing quality of life for all PLHIV.

The training sessions addressed many components of HIV prevention and treatment. “We learned a lot about the nature of HIV in children and practical methods and approaches to its treatment. Moreover, we acquired not only the medical approach, but also its psychological aspect - how to talk to parents and children about the infection, how to make a patient’s HIV-status known – these are of great help in our work when we work with the patients. The main goal is to share the acquired knowledge with our colleagues in the medical facilities we work” – said Kadembay Turebayev, the deputy chief doctor from Nukus. “For me the important outcome of the training is greater HIV awareness and deeper knowledge of safety procedures, which will allow protecting ourselves and our patients from HIV, hepatitis B and C transmission. One of the major achievements of the training was the discussions and understanding the importance of non-discriminative and stigma-free attitude towards patients” - echoes Dr. Dilorom Madrimova, a pediatric from Urgench city.

The medical specialists trained with advanced HIV related skills and knowledge will further pass the knowledge on HIV to other specialists across the country. Empowering medical specialists is a part of the greater initiative to stop HIV among children and achieve full-scale prevention of mother-to-child transmission, which are aimed to fulfill the commitments made and secure safe and healthy childhood to all.