Improving the institutional capacity to prevent HIV transmission and respond to AIDS: During 2014-2015 interventions have been scaled up considerably and HIV prevention and AIDS treatment, care and support have been provided in accordance with the National HIV/AIDS Treatment and Care Protocols. Moreover, the state allocations for the HIV prevention and treatment budget line are expected to more than double in the coming three-year period. Against this backdrop of progress, UNAIDS provided support to Armenia in order to improve the organization of the health care system in order to provide more accessible, quality and sustainable health care services to the population, in particular to the most vulnerable and people living with HIV.
Providing training for teachers in Armenia: About 60 pre-service teachers received a 64-hour special course on HIV, sexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence, leading to around 14 000 pupils benefiting from adequate HIV prevention education at school, from trained teachers. To facilitate the teaching and learning of the new course a guide for instructors and a reader for students was also developed.
Focusing on delivering HIV services to migrants: Thanks to support from the UN Joint Programme, migrant workers and their families were provided HIV testing and counselling services, as an effective strategy to reduce HIV incidence in Armenia. Moreover, community-level activities were promoted to raise awareness among migrants, by conducting peer-to-peer workshops. 755 workers were trained in each year of 2014-2015 in peer-to-peer prevention. In addition, testing and counselling services for HIV infection, hepatitis and sexually transmitted infections were provided to the local communities by mobile medical teams. Around 17 400 community members had the opportunity to be tested and consulted with a health professional and an estimated 33 000 citizens improved their general knowledge on HIV and other infectious diseases.
Preventing HIV transmission among young people: Three-day trainings for youth were conducted in Yerevan and two regions. Overall 126 young people participated in the training, which included HIV/AIDS issues. As a part of the UNAIDS Regional Cooperation Programme, resource centres were set up at healthcare institutions, to tap into social media and new technologies for HIV/AIDS prevention among adolescents and youth. Necessary computer equipment was provided and 25 specialists were trained to manage the resource centres
Fighting against gender-based violence (GBV): A gender transformative programme on prevention of GBV was conducted with the support of the UN Joint Programme and in partnership with local faith-based organization in nine regions of the country. Around 3200 people – boys and girls, men and women and soldiers in army - were reached and sensitized on issues of gender stereotypes, gender norms, GBV and family values, while more than 700 people used counselling services through home visits and individual meetings.