In 18 regions of Russia, there is a shortage of drugs for the treatment of HIV infection

In 18 regions of Russia, interruptions in the supply of drugs for HIV infection are observed. Patient organizations drew attention to this. In addition, they are concerned that the budget for the next year does not include enough funds for the purchase of drugs in the required amount. Activists from 32 Russian cities wrote to the government, the State Duma and the Ministry of Health with the demand to take measures to prevent drug shortages both this year and next year.

According to the report of the NGO “Patientskii Kontrol”, which deals with the issue of providing drugs against HIV, viral hepatitis and tuberculosis, from April 1 to July 10, the organization received 182 complaints about the lack of drugs against HIV in regional AIDS centers. Outages are observed in 18 regions of Russia, as well as in FSIN and FMBA institutions. Most of the appeals came from St. Petersburg, Leningrad, Sverdlovsk and Tyumen regions, as well as from the so-called “DPR”, which is now also on the balance sheet of the Russian Ministry of Health.

In four responses of the Ministry of Health, patients are offered to contact regional health authorities. Almost all requests to the Ministry of Health of these regions went unanswered, Vedomosti writes.

In a collective letter, the activists ask to allocate additional funding for the purchase of medicines in 2023, and as an emergency measure to prevent interruptions, to organize additional purchases at the expense of the 2024 budget. In addition, the letter mentions the necessity of conducting negotiations with Russian pharmaceutical companies on the issue of price reduction.

According to Yulia Vereshchagina, a representative of “Patient Control”, due to the lack of drugs, doctors are forced to change treatment regimens, including prescribing previously canceled drugs that caused side effects in patients. If earlier interruptions mainly occurred with expensive drugs that had no analogues on the Russian pharmaceutical market, which were taken by a small group of patients, now this line has been supplemented with relatively cheap drugs produced by Russian pharmaceutical companies.

Public officials conclude that the entire planned volume of federal budget funds for the current year has been spent, and the coverage of therapy is about 30% of the number of patients who need it.

The representative of the press service of the Ministry of Health reported in response to the request of “Vedomosti” that “patients will be provided within the framework of the budget allocated for 2023 in accordance with the approved commission of the Ministry of Health of Russia with an application for the purchase of medicinal products.” The representative of the department did not answer the question of how much the Russian patients’ need for antiviral drugs is estimated to be in the current year.

• According to the Ministry of Health, by the beginning of 2022, there were 851,754 people living in Russia with a confirmed diagnosis of HIV infection. However, according to the statistics of Rospotrebnadzor, their number is 1137596. This is only those whose diagnosis was confirmed.
• With regular use of antiviral drugs, HIV-positive people become non-contagious to others, live to old age, work and give birth to healthy children.