What is linking?
Linking HIV and SRHR broadly refers to bringing together work on HIV and SRHR at various levels, such as policy, advocacy, programming and operations. Integration of operations includes providing HIV-related services—such as testing, prevention, treatment, care and support—or referrals for these in the sexual and reproductive health (SRH) context and vice versa. The SRH context includes family planning, prevention and management of other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), prevention and management of gender based violence (GBV), prevention of unsafe abortion, and/or provision of post abortion care.
Why link?
From an HIV focused perspective, linking makes sense because it helps build a robust response to HIV. It can contribute significantly to reducing HIV spread, mitigating the impact of HIV, and addressing the unmet SRHR needs of HIV positive men and women.
These are the key benefits of linking:
- Integrating services can increase the coverage of HIV prevention, treatment care and support interventions through higher outreach, and in principle also to vulnerable groups.
- Integrating services can also help address the sexuality and family planning needs of persons living with HIV.
- Integrating services can improve the health of HIV+ persons, or even save their lives.
- Integrating services is especially useful in resource poor settings.
- Linking HIV and SRHR can help improve community participation in HIV and SRHR issues and interventions, support the health-related decision making of persons living with HIV, and lessen stigma and discrimination of HIV positive persons.
