The Meeting Targets and Maintaining Epidemic Control (EpiC) project is an eight-year (2019–2027) global initiative, funded by the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), that provides strategic technical assistance and direct service delivery to achieve control of the HIV epidemic among key and priority populations and strengthen global health security.
EpiC is led by FHI 360 with core partners Right to Care, Palladium, and Population Services International. The project also draws on regional resource partners, including Africa Capacity Alliance, ENDA Santé, the Thai Red Cross AIDS Research Centre, the University of the West Indies, and VHS-YRG Care, as well as global resource partners, including the Aurum Institute, Dimagi, Johns Hopkins University’s Key Populations Program, JSI Research & Training Institute Inc., MTV, and World Vision International.
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EpiC and HIV
The EpiC project promotes self-reliant management of national HIV programs by improving HIV case finding, prevention, treatment programming and viral-load suppression among key and priority populations. EpiC partners with and strengthens the capacity of governments, civil society organizations, other PEPFAR-implementing partners and the private sector to introduce innovations and expand evidence-based HIV services to unprecedented levels of scale, coverage, quality, effectiveness and efficiency.
EpiC’s HIV objectives
- Attain and maintain control of the HIV epidemic among key populations.
- Attain and maintain control of the HIV epidemic among men, women and priority populations who have HIV or are at risk of acquiring HIV.
- Improve program management, health information systems, human resources for health, and financing solutions to attain and maintain control of the HIV epidemic.
- Support the transition of direct funding and implementation to local partners to meet PEPFAR’s goal of providing 70% of its funding to local partners.
What EpiC does for key and priority populations
- Increase access to HIV prevention, including pre-exposure prophylaxis, voluntary medical male circumcision and tuberculosis prevention services.
- Expand HIV self-testing, index testing and network testing strategies.
- Improve treatment literacy, including understanding of messages about undetectable and nontransmittable.
- Provide a range of differentiated health services tailored to key populations, including mental health services and violence prevention and response.
- Improve access to new high-quality antiretroviral therapy and viral-load testing services.
- Engage previously unreached individuals and connect them to HIV services through online platforms.
How EpiC bolsters local programs
- Mobilizes increased domestic, sustainable funding sources for national HIV programs.
- Provides capacity strengthening to local partners to help prepare them to accept direct funding.
- Helps to identify ways to capitalize on local technical and management expertise.
- Promotes unified leadership and management at all levels to control local epidemics.
- Supports the integration of HIV services into national and local government budgets.
EpiC and global health security
EpiC strengthens health systems to prevent and mitigate the increasing occurrence and severity of epidemics, pandemics and other emerging infectious diseases. Our programming aligns with global health security priorities, National Action Plan for Health Security (NAPHS) processes and USAID’s goals.
EpiC and COVID-19
EpiC supports partner governments to prevent, prepare for, respond to and bolster health systems to address COVID-19. EpiC has supported COVID-19 response in 54 countries across Africa, Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America. EpiC offers technical assistance for emergency, mid-term and long-term responses. Read more about EpiC’s COVID-19 efforts.
EpiC and mpox
The project’s approaches include risk communication and community engagement for men who have sex with men and other people with a high risk of acquiring mpox; training and capacity strengthening for health care providers, including community-based teams; support for case investigation and contact tracing; surveillance and other strategic information support; strengthening health care systems’ and providers’ diagnostic capacity; and improving laboratory biosafety. Read more about EpiC’s mpox efforts.
Meeting Targets and Maintaining Epidemic Control (HIV fact sheet)
Collaboration for HIV Prevention Options to Control the Epidemic (CHOICE) (fact sheet)