How is the Strategy Being Implemented?
Federal Implementation
The Federal government's approach to implementing the National HIV/AIDS Strategy spans multiple departments and agencies.
A total of 28 agencies and offices representing 12 Federal Departments play active roles in the planning, implementation, and monitoring of our Nation’s HIV prevention, care, and treatment efforts. Representatives of these agencies and offices serve on a cross-departmental Federal Interagency Workgroup which provided scientific, programmatic, and technical expertise that informed the development of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy that was released in 2010 and the update in 2015.This group meets regularly to provide expert advice, feedback, and guidance on Federal efforts to prevent, diagnose, care for, and treat HIV infection; coordinate activities across Departments and agencies; review the policy and programmatic implications of new epidemiological data and research findings; monitor performance toward national HIV prevention, care, and treatment goals; and identify opportunities for further improving the efficiency, effectiveness, and impact of the Federal response.
Since it was first established, the Federal Interagency Workgroup has been co-chaired by the Director of the Office of National AIDS Policy in the White House and the Director of the HHS Office of HIV/AIDS and Infectious Disease Policy (OHAIDP). In order to continue to serve the American people and protect their health and wellbeing, the group has continued to meet during the transition of Administrations to ensure that HIV prevention, care, and treatment services continue to be coordinated and monitored across Federal Departments and agencies.
Recent activities of the Federal Interagency Workgroup include:
- Development and release of a Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) Framework that was used to Federal efforts to increase knowledge and awareness of PrEP and support its use, and to identify gaps in the response to support improvement efforts.
- Review of data and program effectiveness to address performance on four indicators used to monitor progress on the National HIV/AIDS Strategy for which the annual progress targets were not met: reducing homelessness among people living with HIV, reducing disparities in HIV diagnoses and risk behavior among gay and bisexual men, and reducing disparities in HIV diagnoses among persons living in the southern United States. Interagency subgroups were established to fully evaluate the results, conduct additional analyses to better understand the results and identify potential subpopulation differences, interpret and better understand the results by using data from other sources, and identify strategies for improving performance.
Within HHS, OHAIDP leads efforts to coordinate operational and programmatic activities related to implementation of the strategy across operating divisions and staff offices. This includes convening meetings across operating and staff Divisions to coordinate program planning and implementation, review draft HIV-related funding announcements prior to publication, coordinate web-based, digital media, and social media activities, and participate in efforts to monitor progress toward the Strategy’s goals.