More than $18M to be awarded for HIV research training

May / June 2020 | Volume 19, Number 3

May / June 2020 Global Health Matters newsletter [PDF <1M]

Group of teenagers in outdoor courtyard in Haiti pose for camera, some jump and raise hands.
Photo courtesy of GHESKIO

An HIV research training grant in Haiti will train scientists
focused on HIV prevention and treatment among adolescents.

To continue to strengthen research capacity to address the evolving HIV epidemic in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), Fogarty's HIV Research Training program intends to award $18.3 million over the next five years through 14 grants.

One of eight new projects, a grant in Zimbabwe will build new capacity for molecular epidemiology and genomics with funding to the Biomedical Research and Training Institute to provide doctoral and postdoctoral training in lab research skills, bioinformatics, modeling and data science, in collaboration with Stanford University. In Haiti, GHESKIO Center and Weill Cornell Medicine will jointly provide public health research training to Haitian scientists focused on adolescent HIV prevention and treatment, HIV and tuberculosis co-infection, and HIV and noncommunicable diseases. Georgia’s Partnership for Research and Action for Health is collaborating with Tbilisi State University and the State University of New York to build implementation science research capacity addressing gaps in HIV prevention and care.

Additionally, a grant to the University of California, San Francisco aims to instruct candidates at Maseno University and the Kenya Medical Research Institute on food security and poverty alleviation interventions to improve HIV outcomes. A program led by Washington University in St. Louis will provide methods training, mentoring, and hands-on experience to Ugandan researchers devoted to children’s mental health in HIV-impacted settings. Vanderbilt University plans to build Nigerian research capacity and enable clinical trials in HIV-associated noncommunicable diseases through mentored projects at Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital. Meanwhile, Yale University is partnering with the University of Malaya to provide implementation science training to produce researchers with the skills to address HIV prevention and treatment. Another Yale-based program will strengthen biomedical research capacity related to HIV-associated comorbidities in partnership with the University of Ghana.

Fogarty’s HIV research training program is also renewing funding for four existing projects. Vanderbilt University will continue working with the University Eduardo Mondale to train Mozambique scientists in HIV implementation science research, while also supporting two institutional field sites. An existing partnership between the University of Washington (UW) and the Kenya Medical Research Institute will build additional research capacity and focus on prevention of new HIV infections among women and teen girls. The collaboration between University of North Carolina and University of Malawi will continue to provide training with the goal of producing independently funded Malawian investigators capable of multidisciplinary research. Training at Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia will help researchers achieve autonomy on projects addressing HIV as a chronic condition, in partnership with UW and the University of Alabama.

Finally, Fogarty awarded a planning grant to Makerere University to develop a training program for Ugandan researchers concentrated on HIV, noncommunicable diseases and aging. And George Washington University received a planning grant to strengthen ethical review capacity of HIV trials at Kinshasa University in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) are also providing support.