Diddie Schaaf

Technical responsibilities for HIV in the workplace and gender: policy and strategy development, internal and external partnerships, research products, technical and administrative assistance at country level, and project management.

Achievements:

• Policy development: Development of policy briefs on COVID-19 and the world of work and people living with HIV, ILO-WHO policy briefs on men’s uptake of HIV testing and linkage to services and on HIV self-testing and sustainable models for the workplace, supported the development of a policy guide on gender, equality and inclusion for a just transition in climate action.
• Strategy development: Development of a strategic guidance note on key populations in the work of the ILO and coordination of the work around a social protection checklist for inclusion of people living with HIV and key populations with UNDP.
• Project management and country level work: Led global ILO coordination of the implementation of an initiative on HIV self-testing in the workplace under a consortium supported by UNITAID, providing technical and administrative support to ILO field colleagues, coordinated a gender and non-discrimination project at global and country level on policy development, tools and their implementation on gender equality and work, including monitoring and evaluation and donor reporting.
• Partnership development: Strengthened collaborations with UNITAID on HIV self-testing, WHO on HIV and TB workplace strategies, UNDP on social protection for key populations, and ILO-wide partnerships to advance the work on gender responsive just transition in climate action.
• Research: Technical backstopping of research projects and publications related to HIV, with a focus on health insurance coverage for HIV and stigma and discrimination in indigenous peoples living with HIV.
• Training and capacity building: Developed a 9-module e-learning course and a 3-day training toolkit on HIV testing in the workplace; rolled out training materials on gender, equality, and inclusion in just transition policies.

Short term consultancies with WHO on key population inclusion in National Strategic HIV Plans (NSPs) and compliance of national ARV guidelines with WHO recommendations.

Achievements:

• Analysed NSPs of 46 African countries on the inclusion of key populations based on the recommendations for key populations from the WHO and co-authored a scientific article.
• Reviewed/checked 115 national level policies and guidelines related to HIV treatment services and differentiated service delivery, with special emphasize on key populations.

Conducted a review, suggested improvements and coordinated input from the Community, Rights and Gender department on the Global Fund monitoring frameworks to ensure inclusion of indicators on key populations, human rights and gender. Provided and coordinated input from the department for materials for the next application process and liaised with tvarious departments to align technical materials.

Achievements:

• 90% of input from the department was taken on board, resulting in a modular framework with more focus on human rights, key populations and gender for HIV, tuberculosis and malaria; indicators with more sex, gender and age disaggregation, and the addition of several new indicators on human rights and key population.

Responsible for project management and implementation of parts of the multi-stakeholder partnership CIPHER (Collaborative Initiative for Paediatric HIV Education and Research).

Achievements:

• Development and coordination of policy briefs based on a research prioritization project in paediatric and adolescent HIV, together with the WHO (responsible for parts of the survey development, construction of database, data analysis, advocacy and dissemination of results).
• Coordinated the development of three supplements for scientific journals (JIAS and JAIDS) on adolescent transition, paediatric and adolescent HIV and the Sustainable Development Goals, and research prioritization in paediatric and adolescent HIV.
• Organized successful events in Budapest, Durban and Paris with 65-350 participants (abstract driven workshop, stakeholder meeting, satellite session).

• Team leader responsible for the technical, administrative and financial management, implementation, coordination and monitoring of a comprehensive programme on SRHR of adolescents mainstreaming gender (2012-2015).
• Technical, administrative and financial project implementation and grant management, in close collaboration with different ministries and government officials, transgender women, LGBT populations, sex workers, adolescents and young people in the development, coordination, implementation and monitoring of projects and grants and in providing technical assistance.
• Coordination of and collaboration in qualitative and quantitative studies: a teenage pregnancy study, a second-generation surveillance study of HIV and STIs in sex workers, elaboration of a study protocol and instruments for a diagnosis on male and female condoms, baseline studies on HIV and SRHR, a diagnosis on vulnerability of transgender women, including the supervision of several consultant teams.

Achievements:

• Developed and delivered a tool kit with local evidence and advocacy instruments to governments and decision makers on the importance of investing in SRHR for adolescent and young people, which, together with strengthening municipal youth councils and advocacy, resulted in the mainstreaming of adolescent and youth topics in municipal and departmental policies, strategies and budgets.
• Coordinated the implementation of adolescent friendly services including access to condoms through condom dispensers and local public private partnerships.
• Technical coordination of the first prevalence study of HIV and STIs in sex workers in Bolivia.
• Gender identity law: this process included a study on the situation of transgender women which contributed to the recognition of transgender women as a key population in Bolivia, development of a law proposal, and continuing advocacy that led to the enactment of the gender identity law by the Bolivian president in May 2016.
• Constructed a strong team leading to the successful implementation of quality programs amounting to annual budgets of US$1.5 million.

• Planning, administration, implementation, providing technical assistance and monitoring and evaluation of projects on HIV prevention and service delivery.
• Close collaboration with counterparts, among others, National HIV Programme, LGBT population and people living with HIV, in the development, coordination, implementation and monitoring of project plans and providing technical assistance.
• Designing, monitoring, evaluation and editing of investigations on knowledge, attitudes and practices related to HIV, including the supervision of several consultant teams.

Achievements:

• Strengthened the National AIDS Programme, resulting in the development and implementation of the Strategic Plan for Prevention and Control of STIs, HIV and AIDS, and the first HIV and AIDS law, developed with active involvement of civil society.
• Assisted in the construction and strengthening of the first national network of people living with HIV in Bolivia.
• Interagency coordination of UNCARES (UN Programme of HIV in the Workplace) with 10 UN agencies, with Bolivia highlighted as a Best Practice in 2006.

• Epidemic preparedness and control: surveillance of meningococcal disease for epidemic preparedness, analysing data for the department and assisting with the Multi-Disease Global Surveillance publication, missions to Sudan to evaluate the quality and quantity of the meningococcal disease outbreak and to Syria to participate in an epidemiological study on bed-nets and leishmaniasis.