Background: Knowledge and competence of community pharmacists in HIV care, are essential for translating the goals of differentiated care into improved outcomes. Aims: To assess the knowledge and competence of community pharmacists in Jos, for differentiated HIV care and services. Study Design: Cross-sectional questionnaire survey. Place and Duration of Study: Community pharmacies in Jos North and Jos South local government areas of Plateau state, North-Central Nigeria, between September to November, 2018. Methodology: We included community pharmacists who responded to six items on knowledge of HIV therapeutics with each correct answer recording a score of 1 and zero for wrong answers. Respondents with a correct score of 5 or 6 represent good knowledge. We examined competence on a 36 item scale graded 1 for weak competence and 5 for strong competence. Factor analysis; reduce the 36 scale items down to competency domains. Frequencies and percentages for reported competencies were presented. In addition, aggregated scores for each of the competency domains were used to compare respondents based on years of experience, educational level and employment status in community pharmacy. All levels of significance were set at p≤ 0.05. Results: 73 out of 110 community pharmacists responded to the questionnaire. Of these, only 25% reported good level of knowledge in HIV therapeutics. 69% reported strong competency in identifying drug therapy problems, 31% inter-professional and patient communication. There was statistically significant difference in competency domains based on years of practice experience and employment status p<0.05. Respondents with 10 years or less of practice experience recorded higher mean ranked scores compared to those with 11 or more years. Similarly, employed pharmacists recorded higher mean ranked scores than those who owned their business. Conclusion: Overall, respondents reported low knowledge and weak competency in HIV care emphasizing the need for specialized training before implementation of differentiated care model.

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With a prevalence rate of 3.1%, Nigeria has a generalized HIV/AIDS epidemic. Like much other developing countries, Nigeria has to collaborate with development partners to fight the HIV/AIDS scourge. This review assesses the impact of foreign aid initiatives on the fight against HIV/AIDS in Nigeria. It examines Nigeria's capacity and willingness to independently own a sustainable provision of HIV/AIDS care in the country. This paper assesses the outcomes of the HIV/AIDS scheme. Our review indicates that foreign aid initiatives were responsible for the rapid scale-up in HIV/AIDS services and improvement in morbidity and mortality rates. While foreign aids have

Background: Community pharmacies are located close to the people, open long hours and weekends, making them ideal for provision of sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services, as a means of enhancing access and achieving universal coverage. However, structures (encompassing facilities and resources such as funds, private counselling space, number and qualification of staff) and processes (denoting actual activities undertaken such as: client screening, counselling, mechanisms for referral and collaboration with other healthcare professional) determine the suitability and capacity of community pharmacies to deliver quality SRH services.  Objective: To assess the structures and processes of SRH services in community pharmacies in Jos, Nigeria. Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire survey of staff in 63 community pharmacies of Jos metropolis, Plateau state, Nigeria. Three hundred and ten copies of the questionnaire were distributed to consenting participants.  Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) ® version 21 was used to manage data. Results were presented as descriptive statistics for structures and processes of SRH in the study population.         Results: A total of 296 completed questionnaires were retrieved. Eighty-two percent of respondents reported providing SRH services, which was mainly the sale of family planning (FP) products and counselling. Majority of these services 75%, were only offered on clients’ demand. SRH products sold were mainly oral contraceptive pills and the male condom. In terms of processes, about half (49.7%) of the respondents reported offering SRH services in collaboration with other health care providers, mainly in primary health care centres and private clinics. However, only a small proportion of the staff had any formal SRH specific training.      Conclusion: The composition and qualification of mix of staff in community pharmacies presented some inherent weaknesses in their capacity to deliver quality and effective SRH services. This may impede the desired goal of promoting wider access and achieving universal coverage of SRH services.

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