Ending HIV as a public health threat by sustaining and accelerating a comprehensive HIV and TB response in India under the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR)

The Notice of Funding Opportunity titled "Ending HIV as a Public Health Threat by Sustaining and Accelerating a Comprehensive HIV and TB Response in India Under the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief PEPFAR" CDC-RFA-JG-25-0103 seeks to support India's National AIDS Control Program to achieve and sustain epidemic control for HIV and tuberculosis. The program focuses on implementing innovative, evidence-based strategies that address HIV prevention, testing, and treatment while improving TB case identification and treatment outcomes. Efforts will be concentrated in priority geographic areas, such as Andhra Pradesh, among others, and will focus on key and priority populations disproportionately affected by HIV. This includes men who have sex with men, transgender people, female sex workers, people who inject drugs, people in prisons, adolescent girls and boys, young women and men, and others at higher risk of HIV infection. The program outlines key strategies to reach its objectives. These include scaling up comprehensive HIV and TB prevention approaches, ensuring integrated and innovative HIV and TB testing services for early diagnosis and linkage to care, improving person-centered care and treatment to enhance retention and viral suppression, and strengthening the capacity of national and sub-national entities to manage and sustain epidemic control. The program also emphasizes addressing stigma, discrimination, and gender-based barriers that impact access to services. Expected outcomes include increased rates of HIV testing, improved treatment retention, higher rates of viral suppression, and expanded TB preventive treatment coverage. The total anticipated funding for year one is four million dollars, with one to two awards expected. The award will span five years, structured in annual budget periods contingent on performance and funding availability. Component-based funding will align activities with quarterly targets and include specific programmatic elements such as testing, treatment, prevention, TB activities, and emerging public health priorities. Applicants must propose budgets that do not exceed the total annual funding and include detailed work plans and component-based budgets in their submissions. Eligible applicants include state and local governments, tribal entities, nonprofit and for-profit organizations, academic institutions, small businesses, and foreign-based organizations. All applicants must conduct their activities in India and demonstrate compliance with the Government of India's Foreign Contribution Regulation Act. Applications that fail to meet eligibility requirements, including providing FCRA registration documentation, will be considered nonresponsive and will not advance in the review process. Applications are due by February 24, 2025, at 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time through Grants.gov. The application must include a 20-page project narrative describing the applicant's proposed strategies, outcomes, and evaluation plans, as well as attachments such as work plans, performance measurement plans, financial capability statements, organizational charts, resumes for key personnel, and letters of commitment for sub-partners. The merit review process will evaluate proposals based on the quality of their approach, organizational capacity, and monitoring and evaluation plans. Scores will be weighted, with the approach receiving 40 points, organizational capacity 35 points, and data monitoring and evaluation 25 points. Budgets will be reviewed for alignment with program objectives but will not be scored. The project start date is anticipated to be September 30, 2025, with award notifications expected by the end of August 2025. Post-award expectations include regular performance reporting, annual financial reports, and adherence to CDC and PEPFAR monitoring and evaluation requirements. Recipients must allocate at least 10 percent of their budgets to monitoring and at least 5 percent to evaluation activities. Key performance indicators will include HIV testing targets, treatment enrollment, viral suppression rates, and TB treatment completion metrics. Evaluation findings and program data will be shared with stakeholders to inform programmatic improvements and contribute to achieving UNAIDS 95-95-95 targets and reducing TB-related morbidity and mortality in India.