USAID Angola Health Assistance Program

Deadline: 02-Apr-2024

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is seeking applications for a Cooperative Agreement from qualified U.S. and non-U.S. organizations to fund an Activity entitled Angola Health Assistance Program (AHAP).

USAID encourages collaboration with local, regional, or international organizations to enable successful implementation of the program. Given the limited funding of this award and the broad scope, the Applicant should propose innovative ways to reduce managerial costs of any subpartners and sub-grantees such as sharing office space, vehicles, etc. The Applicant should seek to reduce overhead by considering shared office spaces with a focus on targeted technical support.

Moreover, AHAP will contribute to the Government of the Republic of Angola’s (GRA) goal to “promote universal access to health care and, ensuring equity in care with a view to combating poverty and enhancing well-being” in alignment with the Angola National Development Plan (NDP) 2023-2027. Specifically, the activity will contribute to this goal through contributions to four of the GRA’s overarching health development strategic objectives:

• Improve the provision of quality health care, in terms of promotion, prevention, treatment and rehabilitation, strengthening the link between primary, secondary, and tertiary care;
• Operationalize the provision of health care at the community level and each of the three levels of the health pyramid (central, provincial, and district level), responding to the population’s expectations;
• Improve the organization, management and functioning of the National Health System (NHS), through the allocation of the necessary resources and the adoption of standards and procedures that increase the efficiency and quality of the NHS responses; and
• Accelerate the response to the social determinants of health in order to reduce maternal and infant mortality.

PMI will work with National Malaria Programs and partners to accomplish the following objectives by 2026:

• Reduce malaria mortality by 33 percent from 2015 levels in high-burden PMI partner countries, achieving a greater than 80 percent reduction from the year 2000 baseline levels.
• Reduce malaria morbidity by 40 percent from 2015 levels in PMI partner countries with high and moderate malaria burden.
• Bring at least 10 PMI partner countries toward national or subnational elimination and assist at least one country in the Greater Mekong Subregion to eliminate malaria.

These objectives will be accomplished by emphasizing five core areas of strategic focus:

• Reach the unreached population: Achieve, sustain, and tailor deployment and uptake of high-quality, proven interventions with a focus on hard-to-reach populations.
• Strengthen community health systems: Transform and extend community and frontline health systems to end malaria.
• Keep malaria services resilient: Adapt malaria services to increase resilience against shocks, including COVID-19 and emerging biological threats, conflict, and climate change.
• Invest locally: Partner with countries and communities to lead, implement, and fund malaria programs.
• Innovate and lead: Leverage new tools, optimize existing tools, and shape global priorities to end malaria faster.

Results Framework

• Goal: A Prosperous, Self-Reliant and Integrated Southern Africa Region Regional Development
• Objective 3 (RDO3): Resilience of People and Systems Advanced
• Intermediate Result 3 (IR 3): Equitable provision of quality health and other services improved
• Sub Intermediate Results
  • Sub IR 1: Quality integrated health services and disease prevention and control services at facility and community levels improved.
    • The availability of high-quality health care services is important to establishing universal health coverage and reducing preventable deaths. Quality integrated health services need to be effective, safe, resilient, and people-centered particularly for reaching underserved and marginalized populations. The activity shall provide technical assistance and/or direct implementation support for delivering malaria and family services for all populations at risk, especially the hardest to reach areas, through targeted and equity-based delivery approaches that leverage opportunities from other health sectors and strengthen the health system.
    • Illustrative Activities
      • Provide technical assistance to MoH and partners to maintain high-quality standard operating procedures, analysis of routinely collected entomological data, and tools for ITN mass campaigns and continuous distribution;
      • Support NMCP overseeing and implementing a combination of mass free ITN distributions through campaigns and continuous distributions through multiple channels, in particular through antenatal care (ANC) clinics and the expanded program on immunization (EPI).
      • Provide technical assistance to support the expansion of diagnostic and malaria services at the community level, where appropriate, with a particular focus on strengthening access for unreached populations;
      • Provide technical and material assistance for training and supervision of health care providers, including ADECOS, in the diagnosis and treatment of uncomplicated malaria,
    • Mandatory Indicators Sub IR 1:
      • Number of health workers (HWs) in targeted districts trained in malaria laboratory diagnostics (RDTs or microscopy) with USG funds;
      • Number of HWs in targeted districts trained in case management with artemisinin-based combination therapy (ACTs) with USG funds;
      • Number of HWs in targeted districts trained in management of severe malaria/referral for severe malaria;
      • Number of HWs in targeted districts trained MIP (including IPTp) with USG funds;
  • Sub IR 2: Evidenced based health behaviors adopted
    • Operationalized by USAID as social and behavior change (SBC) interventions, programming for engaging and empowering individuals, families, and communities for increased social participation and enhanced self-reliance in health is a key component of primary health care. SBC programming is critical to contributing to global health development goals and improving community health and well-being.
    • Illustrative Activities
      • Provide technical assistance to the NMCP in documenting and understanding progress in malaria SBC and promoting use of available messages and tools that are proven to be effective;
      • Support implementation of SBC activities at health facility level, including provision of malaria talks, interpersonal communication by health facility providers, and printing and distribution of SBC materials for use at health facilities as required;
      • Strengthen the generation and utilization of SBC evidence and SBC innovative messages to improve the uptake and continuation of healthy behaviors. Healthy behaviors to be focused on include (but are not limited to):
        • Healthy spacing and timing of pregnancies
        • Care-seeking at onset of illness
        • Correct and consistent use of ITNs
        • Improve timing of first ANC attendance
        • Uptake of IPTp
      • Engage ADECOS in FP/RH counseling during home visits to raise awareness of the need for healthy birth spacing practices, prevent malaria in pregnancy and other pregnancy complications;
    • Mandatory Indicators Sub IR 2:
      • Number of persons that received counseling in FP/RH in targeted districts;
      • Number of persons successfully referred to FP/RH services in targeted districts;
      • Percentage of trained health workers in in target areas who are observed following identified critical case management protocols;
      • Proportion of people in target areas who practice the recommended behavior (i.e. such as ITN use-to-access);
  • Sub IR 3: Access to resilient health systems at the national, provincial, district and service delivery level improved
    • The Ministry of Health of GRA has achieved substantial progress towards successful public health interventions. These include the nationwide use of the District Health Information System (DHIS-2) for malaria and other health events; supportive supervision for national care guideline implementation; institutionalized health worker training virtual platforms for nationwide reach. However, challenges persist within the national health system.
    • Illustrative Activities:
      • Assess the health system constraints in Malaria and FP/RH services and provide appropriate evidence-based interventions to address them;
      • Apply blended technical assistance approaches that include coaching and mentoring in addition to enhancing technical skills to strengthen and sustain capacity of program managers at all levels to mobilize, plan and execute standard operating procedures and resources for malaria and FP/RH;
      • Work with and further capacitate local systems, institutions, and organizations, thereby strengthening the long-term effectiveness and durability of investments;
      • Potential government-to-government pilot technical assistance for operationalizing management and reporting, and working with government partners;
    • Mandatory Indicators Sub IR 3:
      • Number of functional/active MOH working groups supported;
      • Number of guidance/policy documents updates and/or disseminated;
      • Number of health providers trained in Surveillance, Monitoring and Evaluation (SM&E) topics;
      • Number of people trained in entomological monitoring (disaggregated by sex);

Funding Information

• Subject to funding availability, USAID intends to make one (1) award pursuant to this notice of funding opportunity. Subject to funding availability and at the discretion of the Agency, USAID intends to provide an estimated $70,000,000.00 in total USAID funding over a 5-year period. The funding breakdown is as follows: Malaria $50 Million and Family Planning/Reproductive Health $20 million. This activity will be incrementally funded over the life of the project, subject to the availability of funds. USAID reserves the right to fund any or none of the applications submitted.

Guiding Principles

• Building on Lessons Learned
• Effective Youth Engagement
• Integration
• Private Sector Engagement
• Coordination with existing USAID Activities, Host Government, and Other Donors
• Sustainability
• Local Capacity Strengthening
• Gender Equality and Social Inclusion
• Prioritizing key behaviors in Social and Behavior Change Communications Activities
• Climate Change Integration
• Apply Science and Technology, and Innovation Strategically

Key Personnel

• Key personnel are considered essential to the work being performed under this activity; therefore, these must be full time positions and must not be shared with other ongoing applicant’s activities. The applicant should propose key personnel who clearly demonstrate the ability to implement the proposed program, achieve the expected results, and integrate the guiding principles, including gender successfully and effectively. See below the requirements and qualifications for the key personnel positions:
  • Chief of Party (COP)
    • The COP shall provide overall strategic leadership and oversight to the activity. S/he shall have depth and breadth of technical expertise and experience, substantial management experience, a solid professional reputation, interpersonal skills, and professional relationships to fulfill the requirements of the activity description. The COP must meet the following education and qualifications requirements:
    • A Masters’ degree or higher in public health or related field;
    • Minimum of 12 years of managerial and operational experience, preferably in managing large donor projects involving coordination with multiple implementing partners or institutions in Angola or the region.
  • Technical Director/Malaria Specialist
    • The Technical Director/Malaria Specialist will be responsible for the technical direction and technical outcomes of the activity. The Technical Director/Malaria Specialist must meet the following education and qualifications requirements:
    • Master’s degree or higher in public health, or other related health science field;
    • Minimum 10 years of experience in health service delivery and at least 5 years of experience in supervising employees or managing teams in an international setting.
  • Senior Family Planning Specialist
    • The Senior Family Planning Specialist overseeing the programmatic and technical aspects of the FP/RH component. The Senior Family Planning Specialist must meet the following education and qualifications requirements:
    • Bachelor’s degree in nursing, medicine, public health, or related area;
    • At least three years of experience in designing, implementing, and managing a significant portfolio of work for family planning projects in/for developing countries.

Geographic Code

• The geographic code for the procurement of commodities and services under this Activity is 935.

Eligibility Criteria

• U.S. and non-US organizations or consortia may participate under this notice of funding opportunity (NOFO). The eligibility requirements below apply to both the principal applicant and to any organization with which the principal applicant may choose to use as a sub-awardee.
• USAID welcomes applications from organizations which have not previously received financial assistance from USAID. However, USAID will not accept applications from individuals. Faith[1]based organizations are eligible to apply for federal financial assistance on the same basis as any other organization and are subject to the protections and requirements of Federal law
• To be eligible for award of a Cooperative Agreement, in addition to other conditions of this NOFO, your organization must have a commitment to non-discrimination with respect to beneficiaries and adherence to equal opportunity employment practices. Non-discrimination includes equal treatment without regard to race, religion, ethnicity, gender, and political affiliation.
• The prime recipient is encouraged to promote involvement of “underutilized” partners and local organizations in the implementation of this activity.
• The recipient must be a responsible entity. When considering making an award to an NGO with limited or no previous USAID experience, USAID may conduct a pre-award survey to determine the organization’s capabilities to implement the proposed activities, therefore, whether the prospective recipient has the necessary organization, experience, accounting and operational controls, and technical skills, or ability to obtain them in order to achieve the objectives of the program and comply with the terms and conditions of the award. Please note that a pre-award survey does not commit USAID to make any award.
• The Applicant is reminded that the U.S. Executive Orders and U.S. law prohibits transactions with, and the provision of resources and support to, individuals and organizations associated with terrorism. It is the legal responsibility of the Recipient to ensure compliance with these Executive Orders and laws. This provision must be included in all sub-awards issued under this Cooperative Agreement. Prior to the award, USAID may request additional information to confirm the organizational status of the applicant.

For more information, visit Grants.gov.