Programming Guidance

Factsheet: WASH and HIV

  • Source:
  • WaterAid, StopAIDS Coalition. 2013.

  • Summary:
  • This factsheet sets out to explain the connection between WASH and HIV and AIDS, and provides recommendations on how HIV interventions can integrate WASH into their programming.

  • Keywords:
  • Handwashing (Hand Washing) Household Water Treatment & Storage Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal
  • Integrating Sanitation into Services for People Living with HIV/AIDS

    • Source:
    • C-Change, WASHplus. 2012. USAID

    • Summary:
    • Recognizing the importance of safe water, sanitation, and hygiene promotion in protecting and caring for PLHIV, the trend is to integrate WASH improvement into HIV and AIDS policies and programs. As part of its palliative care approach, PEPFAR has developed a preventive care package that summarizes evidence-based interventions for PLHIV and their families in resource-poor settings. The package identifies three key hygiene improvement practices: safe drinking water, washing hands with soap, and safe handling and disposal of feces, and suggests integrating these into all HIV and AIDS programs. This report also outlines ways to integrate sanitation into existing PEPFAR programs, the rationale for doing so, and examples of how countries have integrated sanitation into their HIV programming. Guidelines and tools are available as annexes.

  • Keywords:
  • Best Practices and Lessons Learned Evidence Base Handwashing (Hand Washing) Household Water Treatment & Storage People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) PEPFAR Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal
  • Inclusive WASH – HIV and AIDS Webinar January 17- 27, 2012

    • Source:
    • WaterAid

    • Summary:
    • Accessible water, sanitation and good hygiene practices are essential for the treatment and well-being of people living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHA) and their careers, yet PLWHA often face stigma and isolation within their own communities, limiting their access to basic water and sanitary services. This session provided participants an introduction to the integration of WASH practices into HIV-care and vice versa. At the Inclusive WASH website you can access a recording of Lucina Schmich's (Burnett Institute) Webinar on why WASH matters for PLWHA and a programming approach to incorporating WASH into various HIV settings, as well as Julia Rosenbaum's (USAID WASHplus) Webinar, which reviews national programming guidance, identifies small doable actions to improve practice, and introduces an integration tool kit and other resources available for program staff.

  • Keywords:
  • Accessing Water Best Practices and Lessons Learned People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal Small Doable Actions Stigma Training Resources
  • Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Considerations in Home-Based Care for People Living with HIV

    • Source:
    • Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Considerations in Home-Based Care for People Living with HIV.Catholic Relief Services.

    • Summary:
    • This guidance document offers water supply and sanitation facility and hygiene promotion design considerations and recommendations intended to increase access to these facilities by people living with HIV. This guidance document is intended for home-based care practitioners serving people living with this disease as well as water and sanitation engineers and technicians tasked with providing community water supply and household sanitation systems.

  • Keywords:
  • Accessing Water Best Practices and Lessons Learned Home-Based Care People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal
  • Improving the Lives of People Living with HIV through WASH

    • Source:
    • AIDSTAR-One. 2012.

    • Summary:
    • AIDSTAR-One has finalized a new training resource that aims to address problems around water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) at health facilities to improve the quality of life of people living with HIV. This comprehensive, three-four day curriculum has two goals: to build the capacity of individual health care providers to adopt WASH approaches; and to provide guidance to program planners, and administrators in developing facility-wide WASH approaches. The curriculum provides detailed activities to improve WASH systems in health facilities by ensuring a safe and sufficient supply of water, sanitation, and basic hygiene practices exist at the facility level. In resource-limited countries, many essential practices are lacking in the majority of health care facilities making adequate patient care more difficult, particularly for people living with HIV (PLWH) and others who are more likely to get an infection.

  • Keywords:
  • Accessing Water Handwashing (Hand Washing) Household Water Treatment & Storage People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal Training Resources
  • Integrated HIV Testing, Malaria, and Diarrhea Prevention Campaign in Kenya: Modeled Health Impact and Cost-Effectiveness

    • Source:
    • Kahn J, Muraguri N, Harris B. 2012. PLoS One, Feb 2012

    • Summary:
    • Efficiently delivered interventions to reduce HIV, malaria, and diarrhea are essential to accelerating global health efforts. A 2008 community-integrated prevention campaign in Western Province, Kenya, reached 47,000 individuals over seven days, providing HIV testing and counseling, water filters, insecticide-treated bed nets, condoms, and for HIV-infected individuals, cotrimoxazole prophylaxis and referral for ongoing care. The program modeled the potential cost-effectiveness of a scaled-up integrated prevention campaign. A mass, rapidly implemented campaign for HIV testing, safe water, and malaria control appears economically attractive.

  • Keywords:
  • Diarrheal Diseases Household Water Treatment & Storage Journal Articles Programming Guidance
  • Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Considerations for Accelerated PMTCT Programming

    • Source:
    • USAID & WASHplus. 2012.

    • Summary:
    • Many life-threatening opportunistic infections are caused by exposure to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene. Diarrhea, a very common symptom that can occur in people living with HIV and AIDS (PLHIV), affects 90 percent of PLHIV and results in significant morbidity and mortality, especially in HIV-positive children. Studies have shown that children 7-14 months of age show an increase in diarrhea after being exclusively breastfed and this is linked to the introduction of complementary feeding. While previously it was thought that unsafe water was the primary cause, recent evidence is also pointing to unsafe food.

  • Keywords:
  • Diarrheal Diseases Handwashing (Hand Washing) Household Water Treatment & Storage Nutrition People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) PMTCT (Preventing Mother to Child Trans.) Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal
  • FANTA Site – Focus Area: HIV

    • Source:
    • FANTA (Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance)

    • Summary:
    • HIV compromises the nutritional status of infected individuals and malnutrition worsens the effects of the disease. Nutrition interventions can help break this cycle by helping PLHIV manage symptoms, reduce susceptibility to opportunistic infections, improve nutritional status, promote response to medical treatment, and improve overall quality of life. Specifically,with support from USAID and PEPFAR, FANTA-2: a) provides technical assistance to strengthen nutrition assessment, counseling, and support for PLHIV; b) improves food assistance security programming in the context of HIV; c) produces and disseminates program guidance on nutritional care and support interventions; d) helps countries in east and southern Africa adapt HIV-nutrition guidance to their specific contexts through national guidelines, training curricula and programs, counseling materials, monitoring and evaluation support, and capacity-building activities; e) provides in-country support to integrate and scale up nutrition interventions in HIV services in Kenya, Namibia, Rwanda, Uganda, and Zambia; f) strengthens the evidence base about the impacts of food supplementation on malnourished PLHIV; g) supports randomized controlled evaluations in Malawi and Kenya; and h) supports improved program design and monitoring and evaluation of food-assisted programs addressing HIV and its impacts through technical assistance to USAID.

  • Keywords:
  • Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Nutrition People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) PEPFAR Policy Programming Guidance Training Resources Websites
  • Programming Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Activities in U.S. Government Country Operational Plans (COPs): A Toolkit for FY2010 Planning

    • Source:
    • HIP. 2010. USAID

    • Summary:
    • The toolkit was developed to provide people working in the HIV/AIDS field—especially USG PEPFAR Coordinators and USAID HIV field staff —with a set of flexible materials to raise their own understanding and help them facilitate better programming for WASH in PEPFAR Country Operational Plans. The aim is to help people at all levels to more effectively prevent diarrheal disease and other unnecessary illnesses, using simple, effective, low-input strategies that may have not been addressed by PEPFAR programs in the past. The emphasis of this programming guidance is to “mainstream” water, sanitation and hygiene interventions—to make them a regular part of all behavior change and education activities in HIV/AIDS programs.

  • Keywords:
  • Best Practices and Lessons Learned Diarrheal Diseases Handwashing (Hand Washing) Household Water Treatment & Storage PEPFAR Programming Guidance Sanitation/Feces Disposal Training Resources