Frontline AIDS joins new consortium promoting sexual and reproductive health and rights

The IPPF-led consortium is comprised of Frontline AIDS, Internews, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, The Open University, and Women’s Refugee Commission. This partnership brings together powerful expertise in programme delivery, research, capacity building, advocacy and communications, ensuring vital information, education and services reach marginalised populations and people in complex and challenging environments.

Approaches in Complex and Challenging Environments for Sustainable SRHR (ACCESS) will leverage the consortium’s expertise to design and test innovative solutions that enable the most marginalised and under-served people to access comprehensive, evidence-based SRHR. The project seeks to bridge the gap between research and programming by drawing on existing and emerging evidence to inform the design of the programme through an adaptive, people-centred approach.

IPPF Director General, Dr Alvaro Bermejo welcomed the partnership. He said:

We bring distinct areas of expertise and are united by a shared commitment to improving the lives of the most marginalised populations. We critically need to work together to develop new and innovative approaches for bringing sexual and reproductive health and rights for those most in need.Dr Alvaro Bermejo

Christine Stegling, executive director of Frontline AIDS, said:

Sexual and reproductive health and rights are critical to the health of women and their families around the world. We know that, all too often, it is the most marginalised women who have the least access to tailored sexual health services, with negative consequences for their health and their lives, including increased risk to HIV infection. This consortium will bring new approaches and innovations that will help us overcome the barriers that prevent marginalised people accessing sexual health services, in highly stigmatised and complex environments where they experience violence and rights violations.Christine Stegling

The partners of the SRHR Connect programme were announced at a Women Deliver pre-conference event at the Canadian High Commission in London, UK. IPPF, Frontline AIDS, and the Women’s Refugee Commission are NGO Sponsors for the Women Deliver 2019 Conference, being held in Vancouver, Canada on 3-6 June 2019; the world’s largest conference on gender equality and the health, rights, and wellbeing of girls and women.