Consensus on priority programmes and needs and increased national leadership to sustain the regional AIDS response are among the expected outcomes of a meeting of national AIDS programme managers, donors and regional partners on October 21-23, 2013, at the Hyatt Regency Trinidad, in Port of Spain.

With funding from the PANCAP Round 9 Global Fund grant, the meeting is convened by the Coordinating Unit of the Pan Caribbean Partnership against HIV and AIDS (PANCAP) and is part of the process to facilitate increased country ownership by giving countries a stronger voice to determine the overall regional AIDS response.

The meeting is being held against the backdrop of intensified efforts by the Caribbean region to meet the targets of the 2015 millennium development goals and to position itself in the post- 2015 health and development agenda. In this context, the meeting organised into plenary, panel discussions and working group sessions will, among other things: assess regional and national progress towards achieving the targets of the 2010 PANCAP Resolution and those of the 2011 UN High level meeting; update programme managers on key national, regional and global developments and lessons learned; share approaches for increasing value for money. Measures to strengthen national programmes and to harmonise partners and activities in the regional response will also be the focus of this meeting.

A key highlight of the three-day meeting is the book launch of the publication:  Legal and Policy Perspectives on HIV and Human Rights in the Caribbean, edited by Sir George Alleyne, Chancellor and Prof, Emeritus, University of the West Indies  and Prof. Rose-Marie Belle Antoine, Professor of Labour Law, University of the West Indies. The publication is an “outcome of [the] path-breaking symposium on HIV and Human Rights organized by the University of the West Indies, PANCAP and UNAIDS”.  The launch will take place on October 22, 2013

Under the chairmanship of the recently appointed PANCAP Director, Dereck Springer, the launch will be held in the Jade Room of the Hyatt Regency Trinidad, from 7-9 pm.  CARICOM Secretariat recently appointed Assistant Secretary-General for Human and Social Development, Dr Douglas Slater will deliver the Feature address.

PANCAP is a regional partnership established by CARICOM Heads of Government in 2001 to respond to the HIV and AIDS epidemic in the Caribbean.