Founded in late 2004, AIHA’s HIV/AIDS Twinning Center works with US government agencies in countries targeted for assistance under the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and in collaboration with the country operational plan put forth by the US Embassy in each country. The Twinning Center is funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). In March 2014, AIHA was awarded a third five-year cooperative agreement by HRSA, ensuring funding for the program through 2019.
As in traditional AIHA partnerships, the Twinning Center focuses on the creation of peer-to-peer, voluntary relationships between healthcare and related institutions, including schools of the health professions. Twinning Center partnerships need not include a US partner. Local and regional partnerships are also being supported as a way to tap local expertise and scale up successful interventions and programs already underway in the targeted countries and their neighbors.
Through the HIV/AIDS Twinning Center, AIHA also manages the Volunteer Healthcare Corps (VHC), which supports organizations receiving PEPFAR funding by actively recruiting qualified clinicians and allied professionals looking to work on the front lines of the war against HIV/AIDS in Africa. Volunteers share their knowledge and expertise, helping build sustainable human resource and organizational capacity within host institutions and communities.
As of June 2014, AIHA has established more than 50 partnerships and initiatives in 11 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as in Russia and Jamaica through the HIV/AIDS Twinning Center. AIHA currently operates HIV/AIDS Twinning Center field offices in Ethiopia, Mozambique, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia.