In Senegal, Mali and in Côte d'Ivoire
27 January 2020
MALIHEALTH PRODUCTS AND PHARMACEUTICAL SYSTEMFighting HIV / AIDS
On 22 and 23 January 2020, the procurement and supply managers of the ATLAS Project in Mali, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire met in Paris to discuss the management and evolution of the HIV self-testing kits dispensation since their launch in 2019 (between July and October depending on the country). According to the Technical Director of the project, on the 31 st December 2019, the project had about 26,000 HIV self-test kits dispensed to users via health and community centres, beneficiaries of the project in the 3 countries. We interviewed them to learn more about their daily roles in the project and to collect their feedback about the workshop.
Dr Koimé Amon Anzan, Supply and procurement manager
As part of the ATLAS team in Côte d’Ivoire, my job is to ensure that orders for HIV self-tests are properly monitored within the import circuit, to facilitate their delivery to the country’s central purchasing office and to organize their supply to beneficiary sites. My mission is also to monitor the use of the self-tests, to do everything possible to avoid disruptions on the sites by optimizing their stock management and by comparing data with the project’s monitoring-evaluation officers. I also support the Government of Côte d’Ivoire in the organization of certain activities, in particular: the training of managers, the quantification of products useful to the country (thus HIV self-tests), the reformulation and reorganization of the supply systems in place. My role within the ATLAS project is to bridge the transition to the project scaling up by enabling other actors to take ownership of it.
The workshop was very beneficial. We exchanged on what is being done in terms of stock use and the risks involved management. It also allowed us to review the regulations of each country with respect to the regulation and quality assurance systems for medical products, to identify their specificities and similarities in order to formulate recommendations.
Dr Mame Kene SYLLA Responsable achats approvisionnement
Within the ATLAS project, I am in charge of the transport to and arrival in Senegal of the self-testing kits, the relations with the country’s central supply office for their storage and the distribution at field level. I also regularly monitor their use by controlling stock levels to eventually launch new orders and ensure the permanent availability of the self-tests in Senegal.
This workshop was very important because it allowed us to feed back information and share experiences and lessons learned in terms of stock management and orders in each country; but also to reflect on ways of improvement. We leave with a roadmap of the next steps to be taken.
Anthony VAUTIER, Technical Director
As the Technical Director of the ATLAS project, I supervise the implementation of the project to ensure that its quality is maintained. I support the national technical managers, in partnership with the national authorities and our civil society partners, to develop strategies for the dissemination of the self-tests, including defining the target audiences and the way in which the self-tests are delivered in the field.
This workshop was organized at a key point in the project as we are at the mid-point of its implementation. It gave us the opportunity to review what has been done and to establish a roadmap for 2020, particularly in terms of :
- the inventory and management system, including the procurement and ordering of self-tests, as we buy them internationally before integrating them into the national systems;
- the regulatory and quality assurance systems in place and how the ATLAS project can intervene to strengthen these systems both by ensuring compliance with international standards and by supporting our partners to potentially improve their practices on these subjects. As HIV self-testing is a new product, it did not exist in national regulatory systems.
