Futures Group responds to emerging and critical health needs through technical assistance and program development. We work in close collaboration with our partners to promote intersectoral, regionally integrated coordination and planning for managing infectious diseases and pandemic hazards. Our work in infectious disease. Our work in infectious disease (other than HIV and AIDS) includes tuberculosis, malaria, and avian influenza.
Tuberculosis
Futures Group has significant experience implementing infectious disease programs, including for TB as a partner organization within the Stop TB Partnership. To support Ukraine’s response to TB, Futures Group, through the USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1, developed the capacity of national and regional governments to plan, implement, and monitor TB services, including improved detection, diagnosis, treatment, and care. Accomplishments included holding the first all-Ukrainian TB conference for TB/HIV non-governmental organizations.
The AIDSRelief team ensures that all HIV positive clients in Local Partner Treatment Facilities (LPTFs) are routinely screened for TB, while all TB patients have access to HIV counseling and testing. Futures Group’s patient monitoring and management system, IQChart, is helping us share TB/HIV data, including the date when patients begin and end TB treatment. In Uganda, since 2004, we have been tracking both the history of TB and active TB at the time of screening for entry into the program. In addition, we track TB among cohort patients and TB-registered patients who get an HIV test. In Nigeria, the team is currently supporting TB-DOTS centers at 34 LPTFs and counseling and testing at 33 stand-alone TB-DOTS centers in 16 states.
With World Health Organization funding, we identified and trained representatives of people living with HIV to be national TB/HIV advocacy trainers in Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda and subsequently produced a TB/HIV Advocacy Training Manual. In Nigeria, under the Enabling HIV/AIDS, TB, and Social Sector Environment (ENHANSE) project, we assisted the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Control Board in developing and finalizing the Advocacy, Communication and Social Mobilization Guidelines for TB; Community TB Care Guidelines; and the National TB Strategic Framework, TB Public-Private Mix. As part of the UPHOLD project team in Uganda, we trained community health workers on community-based TB DOTS and TB/HIV integration, and led training on TB logistics management for health workers.
In India, for the Innovations in Family Planning Services II Technical Assistance Project (ITAP), Futures Group developed state health and population policies in Jharkhand and Uttarakhand, where we reviewed the current situation of TB programs, identified a new set of objectives, and suggested future strategies to improve program effectiveness. Also in India, under the Market-Based Partnerships for Health program, Futures Group conducts formative research to inform the design of public-private partnerships to engage private laboratories and private providers in diagnosis and treatment of TB patients. Futures Group will subsequently conduct operations research to evaluate different models of private sector engagement.
Malaria
Futures Group is meeting this urgent public health threat by responding on several fronts. Our projects support country and community-level advocacy aimed at giving voice to those affected by malaria and equipping decision- and policymakers with critical data and information. In addition to our work in developing new policies and guidelines, and training providers on new protocols, we also cultivate innovative partnerships with the private sector in support of malaria prevention, including the development of local capacity for distributing insecticide-treated bednets and building demand for products and services.
Futures Group’s malaria portfolio focuses on developing malaria policies and guidelines, training providers in diagnosis and case management, and distributing nets and insecticide. For example, in Kenya, USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1, supported the United Civil Society Coalition for AIDS, TB, and Malaria which facilitated four steering committee meetings to discuss emerging policy issues related to access to TB, malaria, and AIDS treatment. In Peru, HPI-TO1 advanced the Ministry of Health’s National Strategy for the Prevention and Control of Metaxenic Diseases by formulating a national policy based on regional experience with high malaria rates. We also assisted three regions in developing multisectoral plans to fight malaria, evaluated existing plans, as well as supported several study tours to specific micro-networks that have been successful in eradicating malaria.
Similarly, for the ENHANSE project in Nigeria, Futures Group developed a number of malaria-related policies and guidelines such as the National Anti-Malarial Treatment Policy and the National M&E Plan for Malaria in Nigeria. We also developed the now-adopted Nigerian national malaria treatment guidelines for pregnancy.
In Nigeria, the ENHANSE project catalyzed and facilitated the establishment of a national civil society network—the National Coalition for Malaria, Immunization and Nutrition—to bring greater civil society and grassroots perspectives to national policy dialogue and malaria community program interventions.
Through the sister project to ENHANSE—the Community Participation for Action in the Social Sector (COMPASS)—we trained Nigerian public and private sector providers in diagnosis and appropriate malaria case management according to established protocols based on policies and guidelines.
For the DFID-sponsored Nigeria Malaria Insecticide-Treated Nets Project we managed supply chain components, including building and supporting procurement, shipping, local manufacture, and distribution of nets and insecticide, and related monitoring, tracking, and information systems. Additionally, short-term financing for new bednet providers was provided through donor funding. We are currently marketing bednets under the USAID-funded Communications for Behavior Change: Expanding Access to Private Sector Health Products and Services in Afghanistan (COMPRI-A) Project, for which we are working to establish a locally-owned and managed social marketing organization that will continue to support a private sector network of product promoters and distributors.
Influenza
Futures Group can bring its close ties and excellent working relationships with ministries of health, as well as our expertise in policy, advocacy, disease surveillance and modeling, and health communications to assist countries in planning to minimize the impact of influenza outbreaks. Specifically, under the USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1, Futures Group has worked with host countries in the area of avian influenza (AI) to increase capacity to respond to and detect AI outbreaks, enact behavior change to reduce high-risk behaviors, develop innovative approaches to improve under reporting, and coordinate dialogue among sectors when forming AI policies and recommendations.
We supported the Government of Ukraine in launching an 18-month program to assist local governments and communities in containing AI among birds, strengthening animal and human health agency capacity, and improving public capacity and understanding of AI. We successfully worked through an extensive Ukrainian NGO network—previously established to implement RH and HIV/AIDS activities—to promote AI behavior change and communication.
Futures Group also supplied technical assistance for AI pandemic preparedness activities and placed a full-time consultant at the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta, Indonesia to work closely with the Secretariat Coordinator for AI. As a result of this collaboration, ASEAN created an official working group for multisectoral pandemic preparedness. The Futures Group team helped the working group enhance collaboration between health and disaster preparedness initiatives, develop preparedness indicators, and launch country-level assessments.