Consultant to support the follow up of the Global Commission on HIV and the Law multi-stakeholder meeting

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is the UN’s global development network, advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life, as envisaged by 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. We are on the ground in more than 170 countries and territories, working with governments and people on their own solutions to global and national development challenges. As they develop local capacity, they draw on the people of UNDP and our wide range of partners that can bring about results.

The Bureau for Policy and Programme Support (BPPS) has the responsibility for developing all relevant policy and guidance to support the results of UNDP’s Strategic Plan and help countries to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.  BPPS’s staff provides technical advice to Country Offices; advocates for UNDP corporate messages, represents UNDP at multi-stakeholder fora including public-private dialogues, government and civil society dialogues, South-South and Triangular cooperation initiatives, and engages in UN inter-agency coordination in specific thematic areas. The HIV, Health and Development Group is part of BPPS and supports UNDP’s 2018-2021 Strategic Plan and countries to achieve the 2030 Agenda and making sure no one is left behind.

UNDP is a founding cosponsor of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), a partner of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, and a co-sponsor of several other international health partnerships. UNDP’s work on HIV, health and development, as described in the HIV, Health and Development Strategy 2016-2021: Connecting the Dots, leverages UNDP’s core strengths and mandates in human development, governance and capacity development to complement the efforts of specialist health-focused UN agencies. UNDP delivers three types of support to countries in HIV, health and development.

First, UNDP helps countries to mainstream attention to HIV and health into action on gender, poverty and the broader effort to achieve and sustain the Sustainable Development Goals.  For example, UNDP works with countries to understand the social and economic factors that play a crucial role in driving health and disease, and to respond to such dynamics with appropriate policies and programmes outside the health sector. UNDP also promotes specific action on the needs and rights of women and girls as they relate to HIV.

Second, UNDP works with partners to address the interactions between governance, human rights and health responses. Sometimes this is done through focused or specialized programmes, such as promoting attention to the role of the law and legal environments in facilitating stronger HIV responses, including the use of flexibilities in intellectual property law to lower the cost of drugs and diagnostics. UNDP also works to empower and include marginalized populations who are disproportionately affected by HIV, such as sex workers, men who have sex with men and people living with HIV. Beyond these focused efforts, UNDP plays a key role in ensuring attention to HIV and health within broader governance and rights initiatives, including support to municipal action on SDGs, sustainable responses for Health and HIV such as improving sustainability of AIDS financing, sustainable health procurement, strengthening of national human rights institutions and increasing access to justice for key populations.

Third, as a trusted, long-term partner with extensive operational experience, UNDP supports countries in effective implementation of complex, multilateral and multisectoral health projects, while simultaneously investing in capacity development so that national and local partners can assume these responsibilities over time. The UNDP/Global Fund partnership is an important part of this work, facilitating access to resources for action on SDG 3 by countries that face constraints in directly receiving and managing such funding.  UNDP partners with countries in crisis/post-crisis situations, those with weak institutional capacity or governance challenges, and countries under sanctions. When requested, UNDP acts as temporary Principal Recipient in these settings, working with national partners and the Global Fund to improve management, implementation and oversight of Global Fund grants, while simultaneously developing national capacity to be able to assume the Principal Recipient role over time.

Objective of the assignment:

To better understand the role of the law in strengthening or undermining AIDS responses and to examine the available evidence in a systematic way, in 2010, UNDP, on behalf of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), convened the Global Commission on HIV and the Law (the Commission). This independent Commission comprised fourteen distinguished individuals from diverse disciplines and nationalities, each with extensive experience or expertise on matters of public health, human rights, law and development. The Commission’s final report, HIV and the Law: Risks, Rights and Health, was published in July 2012. The report interrogates the relationship between HIV and the law, and includes recommendations covering the breadth of the HIV response. It was based on decades of medical, public health and legal research and the vast experience of the Commissioners and Technical Advisory Group. The report focuses on a group of critical, though not exhaustive issues: HIV-related stigma and discrimination; criminalization of HIV transmission, exposure and non-disclosure; and key populations, including people who use drugs (PWUD), sex workers, men who have sex with men (MSM), transgender persons, prisoners and migrants; gender-based violence, discrimination and inequalities; children and adolescents; and innovation, intellectual property and access to treatment. The Commission made a series of recommendations on each topic, intended to promote effective, sustainable responses to HIV consistent with governments’ human rights commitments.

In July 2017, five years after the release of the Commission’s report, UNDP convened a multi-stakeholder meeting titled The Global Commission on HIV and the Law at Five: Reflecting on Progress, Challenges and Opportunities to End AIDS by 2030.  The meeting provided an opportunity to revisit and critically examine ongoing efforts and partnerships required to meet the targets in SDG 3 to end AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria by 2030 and the pledge of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (2030 Agenda) to leave no one behind and to reach those who are furthest behind first. In this respect, meeting recommended, among others, the expansion of Commission’s Report in the context of the 2030 Agenda, the pledge to leave no one behind, the latest science on HIV and emerging challenges including tuberculosis, hepatitis and other infectious diseases and how to respond to these in an effective manner.   

The consultant will be home based with periodic time spent at UNDP’s Headquarters Offices and will report to the Team Leader: Human Rights, Key Populations and Treatment Access.  The consultant will develop a new chapter to the Report of the Global Commission on HIV and the Law addressing new and emerging challenges including tuberculosis, hepatitis and other infectious diseases  in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.