In the Philippines, the Mayor of Pasig City, Vico Sotto signed a declaration of commitment to implement the Fast-Track Cities Initiative (FTCI), which aims to scale-up the response to the growing HIV epidemic in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pasig City will proactively deliver quality services to everyone, including hard-to-reach populations, by increasing investments to scale-up HIV programs, establishing more treatment facilities and integrated social hygiene clinics, and training more healthcare providers to deliver HIV and COVID-19 services.
UNAIDS will provide technical support in the implementation of the strategy to ensure that efforts at the local level are strengthened to respond to COVID-19 and HIV, including scale up of testing and zero discrimination programmes for healthcare providers.
Learning from the HIV response, Pasig City is one of the cities that is providing COVID-19 testing to its residents, has introduced a loan program to revitalize the economy of small and medium enterprises, and established quarantine facilities providing food and medical care and other essential needs.
