Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2005. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Bangkok Post - January 17, 2005
Apiradee Treerutkuarkul
After discussing the issue with the national committee on Aids prevention and solution, Disease Control Department director-general Thawat Sundarachan said that health authorities needed more time to ensure enough drugs were available.
"Once HIV-positive people use anti-Aids drugs, they depend on it forever, with even stronger doses. That's why the state has to prepare so it can guarantee it will be able to continuously provide the medicine," he said.
Of the 572,500 people estimated to be living with HIV/Aids in Thailand, about 50,000 depend on GPO-VIR, a low-cost anti-retroviral treatment provided under a special health-care programme. The number of recipients, reached last year, meets a Public Health Ministry limit.
Dr Thawat said the ministry has been stockpiling medicine and training staff at each community health centre since it previously aimed to provide the drug under the universal health-care system by fiscal 2006 which starts this October. But the issue has not been finalised, he added.
Deputy Public Health Minister Suchai Charoenratanakul, who chairs the national committee, said 1.6 billion baht has been allocated for Aids prevention and treatment this year.
Most of the money would be used to increase GPO-VIR production. Another 400 million baht would be set aside for prevention campaigns among people with high-risk behaviour such as teenage girls and prisoners.
Nimit Tienudom, director of the Aids Access Foundation, however, believes including GPO-VIR in the universal health-care system is the best way for patients to gain access to anti-retroviral treatment promised by the government at the International Aids Conference last year.
"However, the national committee's lack of a clear commitment to the promise will affect Aids patients' access to low-cost generic drugs and their chance to live longer," he said.
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