UNU-Cornell Africa Series Three Symposium Background

• Address what we have learned to date about these linkages, and it will enumerate the gaps in knowledge to be addressed by further research;
• Identify what is known about the effectiveness of interventions and policies in Africa for HIV prevention, with a focus on understanding sexual and reproductive health-related behaviors;
• Explore the scope and experiences to date of the roll out of anti-retroviral therapies, with an emphasis on the institutional issues of service delivery and the broad spectrum of behavioral responses among vulnerable groups, including children, and their communities;
• Address the economic and social costs of HIV/AIDS, both in terms of the short-term consequences for household incomes and livelihoods, and the long-term implications as mediated through investment decisions in children, household enterprises, and asset accumulation.
• Explore the appropriate methodological approaches to research on these questions. This will include an assessment of the approaches described in the related literature that deal with problems associated with evaluations that rely on randomized control trials, determining causation using statistical techniques, and related issues such as self-selection and non-randomness in the placement of HIV-related health policies and programs. Data requirements for different research questions will also be discussed, and an effort will be made to assess what researchers can learn from existing data sources, and to assess the need for new and innovative panel studies.