The First 55 Steps

A Report of the Microbicide Development Strategy’s
Civil Society Working Group

The Microbicide Development Strategy (MDS) was published in 2006 to serve as a prioritisation framework for decision-making by funders, researchers and developers. Unfor tunately, few civil society, developing country or advocacy voices were included in its creation. To address this gap, the Global Campaign for Microbicides convened a Civil Society Working Group to craft a comparable framework for civil society involvement in the field.

The First 55 Steps: A Report of The Microbicide Development Strategy’s Civil Society Working Group was published in February 2008. This report:

Provides an overview of the status of civil society engagement in each phase of microbicide research, development and introduction and
Identifies the resources and specific action steps needed to move from the current level of engagement (which is minimal, scatter-shot and under-resourced) to where we need to be (with civil society engaging as a full partner).

Thus, it serves as the missing chapter of the MDS and is understood as such by the MDS’ authors.

Read the full report (600 KB)