News / Health
Smuggled HIV drugs flood Zimbabwe
09 Jun 2014 at 06:32hrs | Views
People living with HIV are at risk of increased medical complications following the unregulated entry into the country of the latest generation of ARV which have become popular as they can be consumed conveniently.
There is need for government to urgently come up with a solution to buy its own drugs as it is a security risk to have more than 90% of the drugs in the country being donor-funded.
Speaking after touring the government-owned National Pharmaceutical company of Zimbabwe (NatPharm) on Thursday, Health and Child Care minister David Parirenyatwa said although the government drug warehouse was full, the medicines were secured through donor funds.
Meanwhile, finding patients with a higher CD4 count of 500 in line with new global recommendations for earlier HIV treatment could hamper full implementation of the new HIV guidelines.
National Aids Council (NAC) operations director Raymond Yekeye said while the new guidelines were an aggressive step forward, they represented a compromise as it was difficult to get HIV positive people with a CD4 count of about 500 with no signs of Aids to get tested. HIV testing is prerequisite for antiretroviral therapy (ART).
"Finding the patients with a higher CD4 count of 500 given the fact that they are still well could lower the number of people who know their HIV status for them to benefit from the ART programme," said Yekeye.
He said low coverage of viral load machines could also impact negatively on implementation of World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines.
The new guidelines recommend that drugs be initiated as soon as a patient's CD4 count falls below 500 cells per cubic millimetre of blood.
There is need for government to urgently come up with a solution to buy its own drugs as it is a security risk to have more than 90% of the drugs in the country being donor-funded.
Speaking after touring the government-owned National Pharmaceutical company of Zimbabwe (NatPharm) on Thursday, Health and Child Care minister David Parirenyatwa said although the government drug warehouse was full, the medicines were secured through donor funds.
Meanwhile, finding patients with a higher CD4 count of 500 in line with new global recommendations for earlier HIV treatment could hamper full implementation of the new HIV guidelines.
"Finding the patients with a higher CD4 count of 500 given the fact that they are still well could lower the number of people who know their HIV status for them to benefit from the ART programme," said Yekeye.
He said low coverage of viral load machines could also impact negatively on implementation of World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines.
The new guidelines recommend that drugs be initiated as soon as a patient's CD4 count falls below 500 cells per cubic millimetre of blood.
Source - newsday
