Frontiers Prevention Project

Fabiana Perez, a prime mover behind Amazonas, an organisation doing HIV prevention work among travestis (transgender) in Guyaquil, Ecuador. © 2004 Gideon Mendel for International HIV/AIDS Alliance

The Frontiers Prevention Project (FPP, also known as ‘Frontiers’) is a multi-country prevention-focused initiative which aims to slow the spread of HIV and build up effective and sustainable community responses. It focuses on low-prevalence countries that are put at risk by the growing pandemic, working specifically in Cambodia, Ecuador, India, Madagascar and Morocco.

What’s different about it?

There is increasing recognition of the importance of scaling up effective responses to HIV, and there has been a dramatic increase in policy attention and financial support for the most heavily affected countries. But many people living with HIV are in countries that do not yet have generalised epidemics. The FPP approach seeks to invest in HIV prevention in vulnerable countries where the epidemic is not yet generalised. Focusing prevention efforts on people living with HIV and those most likely to be infected in low-prevalence countries can have a dramatic impact on the epidemic, at a relatively low cost. As well as reducing HIV transmission among key populations, it can slow the spread of HIV in the population as a whole.

How does it work?

The programme involves carrying out activities to increase awareness, motivation, skills and peer support as part of a comprehensive package of services and interventions. The main principle is to mobilise communities and carry out community-based programming on the spread of HIV by reducing risk behaviour and sexually transmitted infections among key populations. Projects always include people living with HIV and sex workers, and often include men who have sex with men and intravenous drug users.

The programme involves two main sets of activities:

  • In Cambodia, Ecuador and India, activities support local partner organisations to deliver a comprehensive set of programmes and services with and for key communities in strategic sites. This involves increasing the HIV prevention capacity of local non-governmental and community-based organisations, laying the foundation for responses that can be sustained beyond the project period, and documenting and evaluating the results.
  • In Madagascar and Morocco, activities advocate HIV prevention with key populations, offer training, small-scale pilot projects, and support to local advocacy efforts. This involves adapting and disseminating training tools, documenting and sharing lessons learned, and promoting good practice in prevention, through partnerships with key groups, within the FPP countries and beyond.

Who is involved?

The FPP programme strategy was launched in 2002. It is an initiative of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance, with the National Institute of Public Health and the Population Council in Mexico, the Global Network of People Living With HIV/AIDS, the Network of Sex Work Projects, the Alliance Nationale Contre le Sida and the AIDS Network Foundation Thailand. It currently has core support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and supplementary support from USAID/Cambodia, the UK Department for International Development Health and Population Division, Abbott/Step Forward, the European Union and Japan International Cooperation Agency. It draws on 20 years of HIV programming around the world.