BANGKOK, March 22 (AFP) - Thai health authorities said Friday they will begin selling the world's cheapest anti-AIDS drug early next month for less than a dollar a day, in a move applauded by activists.
The Government Pharmaceutical Organisation (GPO) is behind the first locally produced anti-retroviral (ARV) "cocktail" which could end up helping hundreds of thousands of HIV sufferers battle the virus which causes AIDS.
The drug, called GPO-VIR, is a single pill combining Stavudine, Lamivudine and Nevirapine, which are known to inhibit the production of HIV in the body.
GPO director Thongchai Thavichachart told AFP his organisation produced a successful initial batch of 120,000 tablets of the drug on March 18 and will first market it at six GPO outlets in early April.
"We will sell it for 20 baht (46 US cents) per tablet, which is very cheap," he said.
The dosage is set at two tablets per day, making the 1,200 baht (27 dollars) monthly cost the cheapest in the world, Thailand's public health ministry said.
It would also slash Thailand's current lowest monthly cost of 2,500 baht for ARVs by more than half.
The GPO aims to increase production to three million tablets per month over the next six months to meet demand, Thongchai said.
He noted the GPO has successfully prescribed cocktails of the three separate drugs for three years to more than 2,000 AIDS patients.
GPO, Bangkok's Mahidol University and the Department of Medical Science in the health ministry are to submit a proposal for GPO-VIR testing on up to 16,000 HIV-AIDS patients, he said.
International group Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders - MSF) welcomed GPO-VIR's launch and said it was considering buying the drugs for use internationally.
"We have used GPO drugs on hundreds of patients in Thailand and we have no reason to believe there is any problem with the quality of GPO-VIR," said the Thailand director of MSF-France Yorgos Kapranis.
"Thailand is the only country in Southeast Asia that is producing affordable generic drugs for AIDS patients," he added.
Thai AIDS activists also voiced their approval.
"This launching of the cocktail pill is a benefit on personal and national levels," said Nimit Tien-udom, director of the AIDS Access Foundation.
A previous Thai concoction touted as a "miracle cure" for AIDS, V-1 Immunitor, was distributed last year to thousands of HIV patients in Thailand before it was declared ineffective by the ministry of health.
Distribution of V-1 Immunitor touched off a storm of controversy among AIDS activists and health officials.
Public Health Minister Sudarat Keyuraphan said in a statement the success of GPO-VIR could reduce expenses for some 695,000 Thai HIV-AIDS patients, some of whom have been paying up to 20,000 baht (460 dollars) monthly for drugs.
An estimated one million of Thailand's 60 million people have been infected with HIV, and one third of those have already died.
More than 180,000 Thais contracted HIV last year and some 68,000 developed full-blown AIDS, according to the health ministry's AIDS division.
Thailand's vocal AIDS activists have long pressed the government for anti-retroviral drugs and HIV treatment to be included in a public health care scheme which allows patients to pay just 30 baht per hospital visit.
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