Development & Aid, Headlines, Health, Latin America & the Caribbean

HEALTH-LATAM: Tens of Thousands Lack Access to AIDS Drugs

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Apr 11 2003 (IPS) - Tens of thousands of people living with HIV, the AIDS virus, in Latin America and the Caribbean lack access to the anti-retroviral medication needed to delay the onset of full-blown AIDS.

”We don’t have time” was the most frequently heard refrain at the ”community forum” held during the second Forum on HIV/AIDS/STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) in Latin America and the Caribbean, running Monday through Saturday in Havana.

An estimated 55,600 people infected with HIV were unable to afford anti-retroviral (ARV) medication in Belize, Bolivia, El Salvador, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and the Dominican Republic in 2001.

According to the Agua Buena Pro Defensa de los Derechos Humanos, a human rights group based in Costa Rica, only 6,000 people in the 11 countries studied had access to ARV drugs.

The organisation also pointed out that the number of people testing positive for HIV and in need of ARV medication was undoubtedly much higher than the official statistics indicate, because the social stigma surrounding the disease leads many to hide their condition.

United Nations figures show that 170,000 people in the region were being treated with the drugs in 2001, most of them in Brazil, whose public health system provides free access to ARV medication to anyone who needs the treatment, as do Argentina, Costa Rica, Cuba and Uruguay.

The combination or ”cocktail” therapy consisting of several ARV drugs is the most effective treatment for delaying the onset of AIDS and improving quality of life for patients.

Around 600 members of organisations and networks of people living with HIV/AIDS in 30 countries in the region complained at the conference that most governments lack the political will to make affordable ARV therapy available.

They also criticised the way the limited funds of the joint UN programme on HIV/AIDS are managed in many nations, the irregular flow of the assistance provided, and the vastly different levels of health care coverage between countries.

UNAIDS said the region spends less than half of the 1.14 billion dollars needed to check the spread of the epidemic in Latin America and the Caribbean, where 1.9 million people are living with HIV/AIDS.

The prospect of going to court to sue for the right to affordable ARV drugs and dedicating four or more years to a lawsuit is not encouraging for a person living with HIV/AIDS, activists pointed out.

For that reason, Agua Buena promotes the filing of complaints with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), which forms part of the Organisation of American States (OAS) system.

In response, the IACHR has requested a number of Latin American states to adopt ”precautionary measures” to ensure access to ARV medication.

Precautionary measures are intended to prevent serious and irreparable harm to human rights, specifically the right to life. According to the IACHR, people living with HIV/AIDS in these countries are being denied the right to life and well-being due to the lack of access to ARV drugs.

Precautionary measures have been approved in the cases of 392 people in urgent need of ARV medication, but have only been implemented in 13 cases, stated the report.

There is sufficient evidence that the actions have not been carried out or, when they have, that they have been slow and bogged down in red tape, said the Latin American and Caribbean Council of Aids Services Organisations (LACCASO) in a report distributed at this week’s regional meeting.

In Bolivia, precautionary measures were approved for 52 people in October, but ”10 of them have already died, without ever receiving the medication,” complained Bolivian activist Daniel Ruíz.

Guillermo Murillo, one of the heads of Agua Buena, described as ”shameful” the situation in the Dominican Republic, where precautionary measures were approved for 128 people, but after heavy pressure was applied, the government only agreed to provide the drugs to 10 patients, and for just three months.

Health authorities report that a mere 200 of the roughly 170,000 people living with HIV/AIDS in the Dominican Republic have access to ARV therapy, and some of them only because they can afford to purchase the drugs themselves, at a cost of around 1,000 dollars a month.

That country is one of the hardest-hit by the epidemic in the Caribbean, with an infection rate of between 2.2 and 2.5 percent of the population, according to the Dominican Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS.

But only six people in the Dominican Republic receive partial ARV treatment through the National AIDS Programme, pregnant women testing positive for HIV lack access to the therapy, and there are no programmes for AIDS orphans.

”Three members of my support group died while they were waiting for the medication that never arrived,” Petronila Brazoban, one of the Dominican patients for whom precautionary measures were approved, told IPS.

Brazoban, 40, has been living with HIV for 13 years. ”I have never taken a pill, and I am really afraid that the same thing that happened to the others will happen to me,” she said.

This week’s forum followed up a similar one held in November 2000 in Brazil. The meetings are aimed at promoting dialogue between organisations and networks of people testing positive for HIV, public and private institutions, and international agencies.