Country Overview

SCMS provides first-line antiretroviral medicines (ARVs) for 35 percent of the 114,000 adult patients estimated to be on treatment in Zimbabwe. 

Despite a highly unstable economic environment, the Government of Zimbabwe is making significant progress in reducing infection rates and in scaling up treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS. Since 2001, HIV infection rates for people aged 15-49 have dropped over 17 percent, from 33 percent to about 15.6 percent.

SCMS provides first-line antiretroviral medicines (ARVs) for 35 percent of the 114,000 adult patients estimated to be on treatment and HIV test kits to perform more than 500,000 HIV tests per year.

Key Objectives

• Improve information sharing and leverage capabilities of partners
• Build capacity in quantification and supply planning among Ministry of Health & Child Welfare partners
• Develop and operate an improved National HIV and AIDS Commodities logistics systems
• Enhance current central warehousing and distribution capabilities

Activities and Impact

Value of commodities delivered as of December 2008: $8 million

Forecasting and demand planning: Zimbabwe is the first PEPFAR country to fully manage its own forecasting and demand planning process. Since November 2007, the Logistics Sub-unit (LSU) of the Zimbabwe Ministry of Health and Child Welfare (MOHCW) has led and managed quarterly updates to forecasts and supply plans for ARVs, HIV test kits, opportunistic infection (OI) drugs and TB drugs, with limited SCMS guidance. The quantification results are presented to partners during monthly meetings of the Procurement and Logistics Subcommittee (PLS).

Effective quantification for adult and pediatric ARVs, HIV rapid test kits, Fluconazole, Cotrimoxazole for OI, and TB drugs—including 24-month forecasts, 12-month supply plans and quarterly review of both—is reducing the incidence of stockouts, lowering the price of purchased commodities and helping donors coordinate funding.

Logistics: SCMS works with the MOHCW to design, implement, and support a strong ARV ordering and distribution system based on a manual and a computerized LMIS. The system has been operating more than a year, with encouraging results.

Distribution: In spite of Zimbabwe’s challenging economic environment, SCMS continues to maintain and operate a fleet of three ARV delivery trucks. These vehicles deliver ARVs to 115 initiating and follow-up sites in all provinces and 55 out of the 62 districts in Zimbabwe, helping to avoid stockouts and treatment interruptions.

Zimbabwe is reducing stockouts of key HIV/AIDS commodities through an innovative program first developed for family planning programs in Zimbabwe. In partnership with SCMS and USAID | DELIVER PROJECT, the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare (MOHCW)/AIDS & TB Logistics Sub-Unit (LSU), the Zimbabwe National Family Planning Council (ZNFPC), and Crown Agents/Department for International Development (DFID) piloted in two provinces a project to add HIV rapid test kits and Nevirapine for prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) to an existing distribution system that delivers condoms and contraceptives to health facilities.

Under the Delivery Team Topping Up (DTTU) distribution system, delivery team leaders carry commonly used commodities in large trucks—or “moving warehouses”—to health facilities, checking remaining supplies and leaving behind what is needed to replenish stocks. Rolled out nationwide in 2008, this program covers about 700 health facilities that offer PMTCT and HIV/AIDS testing. SCMS has supported this roll-out by purchasing an additional five DTTU delivery trucks to supplement the original fleet of five DTTU delivery trucks provided by the USAID | DELIVER PROJECT.

Partner coordination: In an unstable economic environment, coordination among key stakeholders is essential for treatment programs to succeed. SCMS provides key support to the Procurement and Logistics Subcommittee of the National Anti-retroviral Treatment Partnership Forum, a program of the MOHCW to coordinate the efforts of government agencies with donor and partner organizations such as the Clinton Foundation, DFID, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF), the European Union, the Global Fund, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), and UNICEF.