Terms of Reference for an Individual Contract to Support the Inter Agency Task Team on the Prevention and Treatment of HIV Infection in Pregnant Women, Mothers and Children
(IATT) to Provide Coordination and Technical Leadership to Elimination of Mother-to-Child Transmission and Keeping Mothers Alive Efforts in High Burden MTCT Countries
Overall purpose of the consultancy
UNICEF, on behalf of the Interagency Task Team on the Prevention and Treatment of HIV Infection in Pregnant Women, Mothers and Children (IATT), will contract a senior consultant for an 11 month period to be based in New York. UNICEF and WHO co-convene the IATT, a technical partnership of 24 member organizations, which is in the process of reconfiguring its function and structures to better support the Global Plan for Elimination of New HIV infections in Children by 2015 and Keeping their Mothers Alive (Global Plan). The purpose of the consultancy is to provide overall coordination and leadership to the IATT’s work to provide technical support to 22 priority high burden MTCT countries as they work toward the Global Plan goals by 2015.
In order to better support countries to achieve the elimination of new HIV infections in children by 2015 and keep mothers and HIV-exposed children alive, the IATT will focus on:
1. Elimination of MTCT Plans and Progress Tracking – The IATT will play a lead role in establishing the monitoring framework for the Global Plan and working with countries to set targets and monitor country progress towards the achievement of those targets and milestones. This will involve linking with country-level PMTCT programme managers, steering committees and working groups to ensure that country progress is annually reviewed and used to inform future priorities. This progress tracking will be supported to be in line with the work of the Accountability Commission on Women and Children’s Health under the UN Secretary General’s Strategy. In addition, the IATT will work to support the improvement of data quality including better harmonized national data (in line with “the three ones” principle) for national review; to synthesize and disseminate lessons learned and best practices; to support national eMTCT impact measurements; and to monitor priority country and global progress on eMTCT. As part of this last function, the IATT secretariat will play a pro-active role in sharing key quality data and reports to the GSG in support of is global accountability function.
2. Technical support – the IATT will effectively coordinate the provision of rapid technical support to countries toward eMTCT. As a first priority, the IATT will support countries to ensure that the needed building blocks for eMTCT are in place, including bottleneck analyses and costed national plans, and to support more effective, coordinated national planning with PEFPAR, Global Fund and other multilateral and bilateral supports.
Beyond this initial support, the IATT though its secretariat will coordinate and facilitate rapid, focused, technical supports (including south-south supports) to countries that request assistance as they work toward eMTCT. Through its response to such country requests, the IATT will work with governments to build their capacity to address bottlenecks to progress in a sustainable manner. This will include the IATT coordinating directly with country-level PMTCT coordination structures that are already in place (steering committees, technical working groups, etc…) while also ensuring the coherence of technical assistance and technical approaches through IATT partner organizations working at country level. In addition, the IATT will work to ensure that the technical assistance provided ensures that PMTCT is well integrated with other maternal and child health services and that all the 4 prongs of the PMTCT agenda are addressed by working with MoHs and strengthening the collaboration between HIV and MNCH programmes.
The IATT Secretariat will embrace a threefold approach to the provision of rapid technical support. Upon receipt of a governmental request for technical assistance, the IATT Secretariat will first determine if the required technical expertise is available at the country level. In this regard, the IATT will first look to leverage the technical capacity of its membership (and that of the GSG as relevant) that is active at the country level to respond. If this is not possible, the IATT Secretariat will explore resources available at the regional level, including by working with technical support facilities to enhance their PMTCT capacity. Lastly, if required support cannot be identified at the country or regional level, the IATT will mobilize global technical experts to respond including through existing technical support institutions. Underlying this critical role will be a commitment to better utilize, coordinate and leverage the strong TA capacity of IATT implementing partners already active and effectively working at country level.
3. Development and updating of operational and normative tools and guidance – The IATT will continue to play a significant role in developing and disseminating updated, evidence-based operational guidance and tools developed by the IATT working groups and IATT member organizations. The IATT will ensure that guidance is developed and or revised to address new best practices and to support the needed technical and managerial requirements to achieve eMTCT and scaled up paediatric care and treatment. This will include working towards game changing innovation in PMTCT services and their delivery, in part by ensuring that PMTCT is well addressed within the Treatment 2.0 agenda
Scope of the IATT Secretariat:
The Secretariat will be staffed, including staff secondments from IATT members, to provide robust, timely support to the country-led implementation arm of the Global Plan and as such will be linked to the GSG Secretariat. It will also manage and coordinate the involvement of the IATT and serve as a technical hub and clearinghouse of information and tools in support of eMTCT . Key roles of the Secretariat include:
§ Coordinate and facilitate the provision of technical support to the 22 priority countries toward eMTCT by:
Ø Leveraging partners that work at the country level to ensure they are supporting coordinated action toward eMTCT. This includes government ministries, IATT partners, relevant technical working groups, and UN coordination teams.
Ø Linking to the appropriate regional and country-level technical structures and focal points, such as government counterparts, National Steering Groups, MNCH and PMTCT Technical Working Groups, MNCH and PMTCT Managers in Ministries of Health, Technical Support Facilities and other regional structures in order to determine technical assistance needs, ensure that they are addressed, and monitor follow up.
Ø Ensuring priority countries are well prepared and technically supported to respond to major funding opportunities, including Global Fund calls for proposal, and promote better coordination and normative consistency between Global Fund proposals and other funding and implementation support (eg. PEFPAR).
Ø Coordinating and monitor the progress of IATT working groups against their key deliverables in the work plan.
Ø Being a global technical knowledge hub and clearinghouse on eMTCT and use this information to strategically communicate best practices, facilitate/coordinate explanation of new guidance and report on eMTCT progress tracking through new electronic communication (webinars etc) and by fully harnessing the capability of the IATT website. This will also involve distilling key issues that require further high level advocacy and making the case for such to the Executive Committee of the IATT and the GSG.
Tasks of the Coordinator:
The Coordinator will be based in New York and provide leadership to the IATT Secretariat. The IATT Coordinator will work under the supervision of the Chief- Maternal Newborn Health, Health Section UNICEF in close collaboration with UNICEF HIV Section.
Specific Tasks include:
- Managing the IATT partnership including coordinating and organizing with and between a large group of United Nations Agencies, donors and implementing organizations.
- Coordinating with priority country in-country technical focal points.
- Coordinating requests for technical assistance from countries and ensuring that priority technical requests are addressed.
- Coordinating IATT working groups.
- Finalizing key tools for elimination and ensuring their dissemination
- Overseeing the strategic use of the IATT website
Specific deliverables for the 11 months include:
1. “MTCT Elimination Tool Kit,” a collection of tools to support country- level elimination of MTCT efforts is finalized and disseminated.
2. Country gap/bottleneck analyses are supported in priority countries.
3. Costed national MTCT elimination and related TA plans in priority countries are in place.
4. Existing country PMTCT/eMTCT plans reviewed for quality control and countries are provided support in revision as necessary.
5. Technical assistance needs identified, coordinated, planned, organized and monitored.
6. Follow up provided to regions and countries for the implementation and monitoring of technical assistance recommendations.
7. Coordination of IATT meet partnership as it reconfigures itself.
8. Liaise with the GSG Support Team to ensure good communication and coordination between the IATT and the GSG.
9. Travel to support countries as required. (Travel up to 50%)
Qualifications and competencies
a) Education
· Advanced university degree in Medicine, Social Sciences, Epidemiology, Public Health or related technical field.
· Sound knowledge of theory, practice, and application of epidemiological and operational research methodologies, including design and evaluation of research; scientific and technical report writing techniques and methods
b) Work experience
Ten years of progressively responsible professional work experience at the national and international levels in programme management, monitoring and evaluation, in a related field. Experience in:
· Managing complex partnerships including Coordinating and organizing with and between a large group of United Nations Agencies, donors and partners.
· Convening national partners and working with Ministries of Health on the revision of policies and programmes.
· Programming around PMTCT and Paediatric HIV care, support and treatment including good understanding of health systems in resource limited settings.
· Planning, designing and conducting assessments and evaluations, including defining assessment methodology, writing protocols, organizing data collection, analysis of epidemiological data, preparing technical and scientific papers for publication
· Establishing standards and evaluating programme performance and impact;
· Reviewing and analysing a variety of technical review comments on projects, and recommending appropriate actions;
· Preparing and presenting clear and concise oral and written communications; preparing a variety of narrative documents including policy statements and scientific publications;
· Experience working with the United Nations, particularly UNICEF
c) Languages and software
LANGUAGES / READ / WRITE / SPEAKBasic / Fluent / Basic / Fluent / Basic / Fluent
English / X / X / X
French / X / X / X
Fluency in English and another UN language is required (for GS Staff is not mandatory)
BASIC / MEDIUM / ADVANCEDWord / X
Excel / X
PowerPoint / X
SAP
Other: Advanced internet navigation and research skills / X
Other EPI/ Health Statistical Software / X
How to Apply:
If you have got experience of working in a similar capacity and want to make an active and lasting contribution to build a better world for children, send a cover letter, a sample of previous work, a detailed curriculum vitae in English, AND a duly completed United Nations Personal History form to by 14 September 2011 making reference to “Consultant, IATT Coordinator”. Please indicate your availability, and daily/monthly rate to undertake the terms of reference above. Applications submitted without a daily rate will not be considered.
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