These guidelines are part of WHO's commitment to the global scale-up of antiretroviral therapy. The recommendations included are largely based on a review of evidence and reflect the best current practices.

An estimated forty million people carry the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and five million more become newly infected annually. In recent years, many HIV-infected patients in wealthy nations have enjoyed significantly longer, good-quality lives as a result of antiretroviral therapy (ART). However, most infected individuals live in the poorest regions of the world, where ART is virtually nonexistent. The consequent death toll in these regionsâ€"especially sub-Saharan Africaâ€"is begetting economic and social collapse. To inform the multiple efforts underway to deploy antiretroviral drugs in resource-poor settings, the Institute of Medicine committee was asked to conduct an independent review and assessment of rapid scale-up ART programs. It was also asked to identify the components of effective implementation programs. At the heart of the committee's report lie five imperatives: Immediately introduce and scale up ART programs in resource-poor settings. Devise strategies to ensure high levels of patient adherence to complicated treatment regimens. Rapidly address human-resource shortages to avoid the failure of program implementation. Continuously monitor and evaluate the programs to form the most effective guidelines and treatment regimens for each population. Prepare to sustain ART for decades.

This annotated bibliography is intended as a resource for policy makers, programme managers and other personnel working in HIV/AIDS control in developing countries. The aim of this bibliography is to provide representative examples of developing country' experiences on the effectiveness and programmatic challenges for scaling up adult national antiretroviral treatment programmes. Given that antiretroviral treatment in developing countries is recent, and research in the field is still emerging, the articles for which annotations are presented here not only include examples from original research, but also published viewpoints, research letters, correspondence, etc. Though most articles are from developing countries, some experiences from developed countries that are of significance in the global context are also included. The selections are drawn only from published works in English published between 1999 and December 2003. This first edition of the bibliography hopes to provide answers to many of the questions faced by country policy planners in developing strategies for widespread access to antiretroviral treatment for HIV/AIDS control in resource-poor settings. The bibliography should prove to be a useful reference in view of the recent WHO declaration of lack of access to antiretroviral treatment as a global emergency and the subsequent launch of the 3 by 5 initiative, i.e. to provide antiretroviral treatment to 3 million by 2005.

The aim of the consultation was to obtain clear and realistic guidelines as to which diagnostic and monitoring schedules were optimal and how they could be delivered in order to assist decision-making on treatment and facilitate the implementation of strategies and necessary actions for scaling up diagnosis and monitoring at the local, regional, and global levels, with particular emphasis on resource-constrained settings.

In 2004 Malawi began to offer antiretroviral therapy to anyone who needed it. This undertaking would have been ambitious for any nation, but it was unprecedented coming from one of the poorest countries in the world. Health on Delivery examines this introduction of state-provided antiretroviral therapy from an ethnographic perspective. Moving from World Health Organization boardrooms in Geneva to clinics held under trees in rural Malawi, it studies the patients, healthcare providers, and policy-makers involved, considering how the rollout has impacted their lives and professions. In doing so, it examines both the challenges and successes of an ambitious attempt to provide universal HIV treatment with limited money, infrastructure, and human resources. As well as an important case study, the book also offers an analytic framework to address the processes by which global policy is made and implemented. Engagingly written, Health on Delivery will be interesting reading for students and scholars of both anthropology and public health, as well as related disciplines such as geography, international politics and world development. It will also appeal to the general reader interested in global health policies and world development.

These guidelines provide guidance on the diagnosis of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, the use of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs for treating and preventing HIV infection and the care of people living with HIV. They are structured along the continuum of HIV testing, prevention, treatment and care. This edition updates the 2013 consolidated guidelines on the use of antiretroviral drugs following an extensive review of evidence and consultations in mid-2015, shared at the end of 2015, and now published in full in 2016. It is being published in a changing global context for HIV and for health more broadly.