The Ministry of Health will switch to personal procurement of drugs for HIV-infected people

With the advent of a unified register of HIV-infected people in the country, the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation will switch to centralized procurement of drugs for infected people, taking into account the treatment regimen of each patient, TASS reports with reference to the director of the department of drug supply and regulation of medical products of the department, Elena Maksimka.

“We no longer have to order the drug separately from the patient. We actually forced specialists to look at the treatment procedure differently,” commented the director of the department.

Centralized purchases of drugs will be carried out both according to requests for individual patients on specific treatment regimens, and according to categories, for example, “children” and “pregnant women”. For newly identified patients, standardized treatment regimens will be applied. Those who are already taking therapy according to a certain regimen will remain on it, says the Ministry of Health.

Information about patient treatment regimens is collected from each medical institution “virtually manually,” said Elena Maksimkina. “Doctors are now sitting with all patients and analyzing each scheme. This is very useful work, since it is clear how much more training the doctors themselves require; we saw many problems with how treatment regimens are formed locally,” she said.

According to the Ministry of Health, 824 cases of HIV infection have been registered in Russia, of which 40% of patients are taking therapy. The regional situation in terms of treatment coverage ranges from 20 to 90%, which will be taken into account during centralized drug procurement.

As Maksimkina clarified, about 70% of people with HIV are on the first line of therapy, the average cost of which is 30 thousand rubles per year. “The minimum cost is 9,600, and this is a good regimen, on drugs recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO),” she added.

On the second line of drugs, to which the patient is transferred if he develops resistance to drugs from the first line, the average cost can range from 50 to 140 thousand rubles per year. Third-line drugs and combinations of drugs for other diseases, in particular tuberculosis and hepatitis, cost more than 200 thousand annually.

In November, it became known that starting from 2017, Russia is moving to centralized procurement of antiretroviral drugs. The solution will reduce the cost of drugs and ensure more complete coverage of antiretroviral therapy for patients with HIV and tuberculosis.

Before the transition to centralized procurement of antiretroviral drugs, their acquisition was handled directly by regional authorities, about whom patients had repeatedly complained. In 2016, interruptions in the supply of HIV medications occurred in more than 30 cities of Russia. It was reported that in the Sverdlovsk region there will only be enough drugs until February 15, 2017. Before this, in 2015, in the Republic of Crimea, the purchase of drugs for the treatment of HIV infection occurred with a significant delay, which caused shortages in the supply of drugs.

Earlier, the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation announced the creation of a unified register of HIV-infected people, which will indicate the passport details of patients and their diagnosis. Concomitant diseases, the presence of disability, the results of dispensary observation and information on the discharge and dispensing of medications will also be noted. Information exchange will take place through a secure data network.

The government hopes the registry will help prevent disruptions in drug supplies, but patient advocates worry about data privacy.

The day before, WHO stated that about 40% of HIV-infected people do not know about their disease. The organization insists on distributing tests that can be done independently at home.