National AIDS Commissions in Africa: Performance and emerging challenges

This article consolidates and expands on evidence on how National AIDS Commissions (NACs) in sub-Saharan Africa are measuring up to expectations that drove their rapid adoption across the continent. While their overall performance seems reasonably good, most NACs still lack adequate power and incentive structures to hold line ministries accountable, a key requirement for co-ordinating activities and mainstreaming HIV-AIDS across the public sector. Second-generation African NACs urgently need the authority and institutional stature to effectively co-ordinate the channelling of the larger funds now available through government bureaucracy. The evolution of the epidemic also imposes requirements different from those when the current NAC architecture was crafted. © 2009 Overseas Development Institute.