HVI/AIDS (INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO)
MANILA, Philippines — Over 370,000 bottles of HIV medications are set to arrive within 2023, which will be enough to cover patients nationwide.
The Department of Health (DOH) made this assurance on Wednesday in response to Network Plus Philippines’ statement on Tuesday, demanding the department to address the dwindling supply of HIV medications.
To start with, the DOH expects 58,000 bottles of Tenofovir-Lamivudine-Dolutegravir (TLD) to arrive by the end of June. The shipment, the DOH said, will cover the needs of current patients, new enrollees, and estimated shiftees.
An additional 243,000 bottles of TLD are also set to arrive by July 2023 and another 292,000 bottles in September 2023.
It attributed the reported incidents of low stocks of antiretroviral drugs to an “unprecedented increase in the use of TLD among HIV patients prior to the targeted full-scale rollout of the transition from their existing regimens.”
“In accordance with the Philippine TLD Transition Plan, treatment-naive patients as well as those who developed adverse drug reactions in their current regimens (i.e., efavirenz) were prioritized for transition to TLD in 2020 to 2022,” explained DOH.
“However, as the PLHIV (people living with HIV) community became more aware of the promising superiority of TLD over other regimens through word of mouth, social media, learning sessions with support groups, and information dissemination by the treatment facilities, there was notable increase in the uptake of TLD across the facilities,” it added.
To ensure that there will be enough medications for people living with HIV until next year, the DOH will also facilitate the entry of 146,000 more bottles.