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Costly drugs and tests block AIDS treatment

    JOHANNESBURG

    The high cost of laboratory tests and medicines are preventing more than a million HIV-positive people from accessing treatment, Kenya's National AIDS Control Council (NACC) has said.

    According to NACC director, Patrick Orege, only 28,000 of the estimated 1.4 million infected people had been tested and were using the available antiretrovirals.

    He said the rest were unable to afford the US $26 per test charged by selected public health facilities, and pay a further $26 per month for anti-AIDS drugs.

    A local newspaper, The Nation, quoted Orege as saying: "We have a reasonable stock of antiretrovirals but the problem is how to make them available to the needy. We need a shorter and more affordable process that would favour the poor."

    This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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