On July 16, 2020, the HHS Office of Infectious Disease and HIV/AIDS Policy hosted a quarterly stakeholder webinar on efforts to implement the Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America (EHE) initiative.

The event included updates from several federal partners including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Health Resources and Services Administration (Bureau of Primary Health Care and the HIV/AIDS Bureau), the Indian Health Service, the National Institutes of Health, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, and the Office of HIV/AIDS Housing at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

A few highlights:

CDC: We at CDC are working on innovative efforts to prevent HIV during COVID-19 by supporting organizations through actions such as flexible administration options, extended deadlines, new guidance regarding testing, PrEP, STD diagnosis and treatment, and implementation of syringe services programs.

HOPWA: HUD’s Office of HIV/AIDS Housing has been working with OIDP and other federal partners to ensure housing needs of people with HIV are considered in EHE planning; a HOPWA resource tool has been developed and provided to EHE Phase 1 jurisdictions.

HRSA HAB: HRSA’s HIV/AIDS Bureau Associate Administrator Dr. Laura Cheever discussed FY 2020 EHE awards distributed to Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program (RWHAP) recipients in March 2020, identified the challenges ahead as the program continues to move forward with the initiative, and highlighted innovations from COVID-19 to accelerate the RWHAP work to meet the challenges of EHE.

HRSA BPHC: HRSA-funded health centers—including the 195 health centers who HRSA awarded nearly $54 million to expand HIV prevention services—play an important role in Ending the HIV Epidemic by preventing infection of HIV and responding to, diagnosing, and treating patients with HIV.

IHS: In 2019, the Indian Health Service reported nearly 350,000 American Indian and Alaska Native patients between the ages of 13-64 were screened for HIV – a 31% overall screening rate. The largest HIV patient cohorts in IHS overlapping with some of the areas hardest hit by COVID19, ART programs and patients have implemented an impressive set of compensatory strategies, including telehealth, for delivery of care.

NIH: NIH, through our Centers will continue to foster new and expand existing partnerships between our EHE partners, local health departments and community to evaluate novels ways of achieving the goals of the four pillars of EHE.

SAMHSA: SAMHSA’s mission to reduce the impact of Mental Illness and Substance Use Disorders on American communities remains connected to Ending the HIV Epidemic by supporting treatment access, evidence based technical assistance, HIV prevention navigator grants, and increased flexibilities for both telehealth and HIV self-testing thereby facilitating the best care for this vulnerable populations.

For more details please access the slides (PDF, 4.1 MB) and recording (MP3, 22.3 MB) from this session. Participants in the webinar asked our speakers many questions about EHE. We answered as many questions as we could during the live webinar. We will soon post those answers, along with answers for the questions we couldn’t respond to in the available time. You can find the Q&A responses on our EHE “Learn More” page soon.

I encourage all of you to watch my new weekly EHE updates on @HIV.gov on Twitter. Anyone can view them; no account needed. My goal is to quickly fill you in on EHE and related HIV news.

Follow the HIV.gov blog for details on the next EHE Quarterly Stakeholder webinar coming up this fall!

For more information about Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America, visit HIV.gov.