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ABSTRACT The Global Fund Board recently approved three TB and HIV grants for Tanzania, two of which have a government principal recipient (the Ministry of Finance and Planning). The third PR is AMREF Health Africa. The Technical Review Panel cited numerous strengths in the funding request, including the fact that the request identified key populations for TB: i.e. HIV-positive adults and children, mining communities, elderly persons, prisoners, people with diabetes, people who inject drugs, health workers and people living in urban slums.

ABSTRACT In Georgia, the government supports opioid substitution therapy programs at the same time as it enforces repressive drug policies and laws on the use of illicit drugs. Activists have been using human rights arguments to convince the government to change its repressive policies. In this commentary, Tinatin Zardiashvili argues that a public health and harm reduction approach might prove more effective.

ABSTRACT Ukraine stands to lose $27 million of its 2014-2016 allocation if it does not live up to its commitment to take over responsibility for funding methadone substitution therapy. The commitment was included as a condition in Ukraine’s TB/HIV grant agreements.

ABSTRACT An assessment conducted by the regional “Harm Reduction Works – Fund it!” program in six countries in Eastern Europe and Central Asia found that harm reduction programs remain inadequate. None of the countries in the study met international guidelines for access to needle substitution programs and opioid substitution therapy.

ABSTRACT Needle exchange and opioid substitution therapy programs are a small but resourceful response to a growing threat of injected drug use (IDU) in sub-Saharan Africa, which is beginning to drive the HIV epidemic and threatens to undermine the investment in reducing the burden of disease.

ABSTRACT The Global Fund is urging Ukraine's government to approve a resolution paving the way for emergency deliveries of critical medicines and other health commodities into the country's restive east, part of which is currently controlled by Russian troops.