AEGiS-Bangkok Post: Plan to include anti-Aids drugs for patients in 30-baht scheme: Decision could be made next week

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Plan to include anti-Aids drugs for patients in 30-baht scheme: Decision could be made next week

Bangkok Post - July 5, 2001
Aphaluck Bhatiasevi

Anti-retroviral drugs for HIV/Aids patients could be included in the 30-baht health scheme after a national Aids gathering next week, Public Health Minister Sudarat Keyuraphan said yesterday. The scheme, running in 21 provinces, does not cover the drugs. The gathering is expected to draw 2,300 Aids activists, doctors, scientists, academics, NGOs, social workers and people with HIV/Aids.

Deputy Health Minister Suraphong Suebwonglee said the effectiveness of the drugs, and their price, would be considered. No-one was sure whether the drugs would work in prolonging the lives of people with HIV/Aids. Citing the case of Cozy Johnson, a young African boy who drew attention of world leaders to the Aids problem in Africa during last year's Durban conference, Dr Suraphong said the boy died of Aids despite taking anti-retroviral drugs. "Taking anti-retroviral drugs is not the only factor in making an HIV-positive person live longer," he said. Dr Suraphong said even though the drugs were not included now, the scheme did cover all costs incurred in treating patients from opportunistic infections.

Mrs Sudarat said some hospital wards in Chiang Mai were full of HIV/Aids patients, many with serious illnesses like meningococcal meningitis and pneumonia.

Patients stood to pay tens of thousands of baht to treat those illnesses, but if they were registered with hospitals under the 30-baht scheme they would pay only 30 baht. Mrs Sudarat said the Government Pharmaceutical Organisation had been asked to make locally, imported Aids drugs such as ddI, which would cut patient's monthly expenses by almost half. The first drugs would come off the production line next week, she said. The locally-made drugs would cost only 2,500 baht a month, compared with 4000 baht previously, said Mrs Sudarat.

"Though HIV/Aids was not one of the main issues to be tackled by this government, we're concerned about the seriousness of the problem," she said, adding that the virus kills 30,000 people a year, and that 30,000 new infections are reported each year.

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