Dodoma: The government has accelerated the fight against HIV and AIDS by strengthening strategic partnership with the EGPAF Institute, a move aimed at completely eliminating mother-to-child transmission and improving maternal and child health services in the country.
This was stated by Dr. Florence Samizi, May 04, 2026 in Dodoma, when she met with a delegation of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) led by the President and International Executive Director, Dr. Doris Macharia and the EGPAF Tanzania team led by the Resident Director, Dr. Sajida Kimambo on behalf of the Minister of Health, Mr. Mohamed Mchengerwa, in talks aimed at strengthening cooperation to improve health services in the country.
Dr. Samizi said the government is continuing to build a strong, sustainable and integrated health system, aimed at strengthening maternal and child services and eliminating mother-to-child transmission of HIV.
He said the mission’s visit aimed to continue the long-standing partnership that has existed since 2003, as well as to introduce Dr. Macharia to the Ministry leaders and discuss the country’s priorities in line with the institution’s areas of expertise to further strengthen the partnership.
Dr. Samizi identified priority areas in which the Government will continue to collaborate with EGPAF, including improving the quality of maternal and child health services to eliminate HIV, hepatitis and syphilis in infants and strengthening cooperation in accessing financial resources and technical assistance to ensure the sustainability of these services, especially during this period of declining donor funding.
EGPAF President, Dr. Doris Macharia, said the institution is ready to continue collaborating with the Government of Tanzania in various priority areas, including establishing a sentinel surveillance system to identify and address new infections in children.
He said EGPAF is in the process of including Tanzania in its global Generation Zero Campaign, which aims to help countries conduct an analysis of priorities and resources needed to completely eliminate HIV, hepatitis and syphilis in infants.
He said the institution will continue to provide technical assistance in conducting an assessment of mother-to-child transmission (Vertical Transmission Audit) as well as helping to develop a system that will enable new infections to be identified, reported and discussed with the aim of finding solutions, as is the case with maternal deaths.
Dr. Samizi stressed the importance of timely completion of the analysis report on priorities and costs needed to eliminate infections in infants so that it can be incorporated into the Ministry’s strategic plans and project documents for seeking implementation resources.
