Publications by authors named "Alok Gangaramany"

Article Synopsis
  • Due to decreasing donor funding for HIV programs in low- and middle-income countries, efforts are being made to integrate HIV prevention into public health systems to ensure long-term sustainability, particularly in Zambia's voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) program.
  • A framework was created to explore how individual decision-makers within the government may create barriers in shifting funding support from NGOs to government structures, through interviews with key stakeholders in the Ministry of Health and other involved parties.
  • The study identified three key decision-making phases for the transition to a sustainable VMMC program: developing a new funding strategy, creating policies for infant and adolescent male circumcision, and finding efficient implementation models, highlighting the behavioral dynamics that impede effective
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Applied behaviour science's focus on individual-level behaviours has led to overestimation of and reliance on biases and heuristics in understanding behaviour and behaviour change. Behaviour-change interventions experience difficulties such as effect sizes, validity, scale-up, and long-term sustainability. One such area where we need to re-examine underlying assumptions for behavioural interventions in Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Tuberculosis (TB) prevention, which seek population-level benefits and sustained, measurable impact.

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Background: Acceptability and preference research play a crucial role in the design, evaluation, and implementation of any new prevention product in any geographical setting. They also play a critical role in the development of clinical guidelines and policies. A wide range of acceptability studies have been conducted in diverse general and key populations for various new HIV prevention products worldwide.

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Background: Transactional sexual relationships contribute to a high incidence of HIV infection among adolescent girls and young women (AGYW) living in low-resource settings. Cash transfers (CT) are a structural approach to reduce sexual risk behaviors, but their positive economic effects frequently fade after the program ends. We aimed to understand AGYW's decision-making processes related to sexual, relationship, and financial decisions, in order to design a framework for a CT program that could lead to long-term financial independence and reduced transactional sex among AGYW.

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