PRNewswire - December 7, 2001

WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 /PRNewswire/ -- The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) commends the private foundations expected to commit $100 million in new funding to link prevention and care of HIV/AIDS in developing countries through an unprecedented move to bring support and treatments to thousands of infected people. The project, MTCT-Plus, will build care and support for women and children with HIV onto current programs to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV. The MTCT-Plus strategy recognizes the rapidly increasing opportunities in HIV care, even in very difficult circumstances, as drug prices have plummeted and programs have begun to ready themselves for service delivery. Acting as a community, this multi-foundation group is responding with a tremendous commitment over the next five years towards a program in which prevention of mother-to-child transmission (MTCT) is linked to treatment initiatives aimed at increasing the chances of survival for both infected mothers and their infants.

As one of the leading groups working in MTCT through its international program to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV, the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation has been an active collaborator in the development of the MTCT-Plus initiative, and will facilitate the implementation of such additional services onto its existing sites. The coordination of the programmatic aspects of the entire MTCT-Plus initiative, including the technical and operational challenges of the program, are being led by Allan Rosenfield, Dean of the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.

"The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation commends this multi-foundation group for their tremendous commitment to extend HIV/AIDS care and prevention services to mothers and children and ultimately entire families. Support by private foundations has been critical in the international response to HIV/AIDS from the beginning, and I applaud these foundations for acknowledging that more can and must be done," said Kate Carr, president and CEO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. "We are honored that this esteemed group of foundations acknowledged the success of programs to prevent transmission of HIV from a mother to her child and recognized that many of the sites we support are in the position to begin implementing MTCT-Plus immediately."

While many U.S. and international foundations are contemplating funding, commitments have already been received by the Bill & Melinda Gates, William and Flora Hewlett, Robert Wood Johnson, Henry J. Kaiser Family, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur, David and Lucile Packard, Rockefeller and UN foundations.

The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation will work closely with the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University to link EGPAF sites to the more comprehensive services offered for HIV infected mothers and their children offered by MTCT-Plus. Infrastructure that has been developed through EGPAF's program provides voluntary counseling and testing which identifies individuals needing treatment. EGPAF sites already encourage optimal supportive care for all mothers including vitamins, nutrition, iron, and folic acid. These sites screen pregnant mothers with voluntary counseling and testing thereby providing important information to HIV negative mothers on how to protect themselves and prevent HIV infection. Through MTCT-Plus, it is anticipated that prophylaxis and treatment for opportunistic infections, antiretrovrials and additional psychosocial support will now become available.

Those mothers found to be HIV-positive would be enrolled in vertical prevention protocols, followed over time clinically with appropriate therapy being initiated when clinically indicated. These more comprehensive care and support programs will address the needs of mothers, children and families in a broader sense.

"The Foundation acknowledges that preventing a baby from acquiring HIV is an important first step," said Dr. Cathy Wilfert, scientific director of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. "It is equally important to ensure that these babies have healthy parents and communities to take care of them. It is well recognized that a mother's early death from AIDS greatly increases the health and social risks faced by her children. There is an important opportunity, therefore, to enhance the effectiveness of these prevention efforts by extending care to mothers, so they will have the possibility of surviving their own HIV infections for a substantially extended period. The MTCT-Plus concept is sound, and it is timely."

The operational basis for this effort builds on the antenatal clinic surveillance sites run by leaders in MTCT throughout developing countries, including the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, UNICEF, and Medecins Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders).

The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation is the leading worldwide nonprofit organization dedicated to identifying, funding, and conducting pediatric HIV/AIDS research as well as promoting global education, awareness and compassion about HIV/AIDS in children. In addition, the Foundation is committed to working on other serious and life threatening illnesses facing children through the newly created Glaser Pediatric Research Network. The Network brings together five of the nation's pre-eminent academic medical centers in an unprecedented collaboration that will accelerate better treatments for seriously ill children, help train the next generation of pediatric clinical investigators, and serve as a united voice to advocate policies that improve children's health worldwide.

SOURCE Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation

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