Today at Brown

The HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa is a pervasive issue. Those who are fortunate enough to be healthy are still participants in a society carrying a heavy and awful burden. Advancing medical education in Africa is not only important to improving health care, but also to brightening the continent’s economic future. Brown is leading an effort to help.

With $1.1 million in funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development and from Higher Education for Development, faculty in the Warren Alpert Medical School will partner with the University of Ghana on a higher education initiative for HIV/AIDS. We spoke recently with Tim Flanigan, director of infectious diseases at The Miriam Hospital and Rhode Island Hospital, and Awewura Kwara, both faculty in the Department of Medicine, and asked them to explain what the effort will involve and why it matters.

How can higher education in Africa improve the course of the continent’s HIV/AIDS pandemic?

[Flanigan] Ghana is a leading country in West Africa with an emerging economy and relatively new but stable democracy. The University of Ghana plays a lead role in higher education in all fields within Ghana and throughout the West African subregion. Strengthening the curriculum, educational resources, and faculty development in the theme of HIV and AIDS has the potential to strengthen the university overall and aid in addressing development challenges such as HIV/AIDS throughout Ghana and the subregion. To this end, the University of Ghana College of Health Sciences which includes the Colleges of Medicine, Dentistry, Nursing, Pharmacology, Public Health, and Allied Health Sciences, has proposed “twinning” with the strengths of Brown University in conjunction with Tufts and Yale University.

In what ways is HIV/AIDS related to development in Africa?

[Kwara] Recent UNAIDS data (2009) indicates that about 33.4 million Africans are infected. HIV/AIDS has enormous national and regional implications. Countries that are heavily affected by HIV/AIDS have reduced life expectancy and a high number of orphans as well as limited resources to care for and educate younger generation. In addition, there is gender inequality in HIV vulnerability, as nearly 60 percent of HIV infection in sub-Saharan Africa occurs in women. Consequently, there is breakdown of family structure and security especially for children. HIV/AIDS also affects the economic, military, security, and political interest of states because the working-age group is most affected. An assessment by the the United Nations Development Program basically says that HIV/AIDS is the single greatest reversal in human development in modern times.

Please describe the program you hope to build with the University of Ghana.

[Flanigan] In order to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic one has to transcend standard disciplinary boundaries. The goals of this higher education initiative for HIV/AIDS are to strengthen curriculum development for pre-clinical education, develop excellence in HIV/AIDS education research by strengthening faculty development, enhance training among professionals throughout the country in health sciences related to HIV and AIDS, and establish a National Center of Excellence for HIV/AIDS at the University of Ghana. The center would not only develop a multidisciplinary cadre of healthcare providers and researchers for Ghana but also would be a center for training for people from the West African sub-region.

[Kwara] In additon to myself and Professor Flanigan, key members of the team include Biomed Dean Ed Wing, Director of Brown Global Health Initiative Professor Susan Cu-Uvin, and University of Ghana Professors Aaron Lawson, Andrew Lawson and Margaret Lartey.

What are the steps to achieving those goals?

[Flanigan] We have a five-year strategic plan developed by the partners. The initiative aims to foster collaboration, leverage additional funding, and develop the center of excellence to respond to the HIV and AIDS challenges. Implementation of a higher educational initiative on HIV/AIDS should provide additional resources to scale up the response throughout the country; contribute to the achievement of universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care, and support and the MDG; and better position Ghana to address the epidemic over the long term.

How will you know you've been successful?

[Kwara] We’ll be looking at indicators of sustainability, such as integration of content on HIV/AIDS care and prevention into curricula of health sciences schools and establishing ongoing HIV/AIDS distance learning in healthcare professions throughout Ghana. [We’ll also look at] impact indicators such as the HIV/AIDS competencies of healthcare graduates and community-based HIV/AIDS healthcare professionals.

It is our hope that undergraduate students, graduate students, scholars and faculty from all segments at Brown, Tufts, and Yale universities will collaborate with both undergraduate and graduate students and faculty at the University of Ghana to address the multiple challenges of the HIV/AIDS epidemic.