U.S. seeks to constrain global AIDS program costs

The Boston Globe: "US officials have asked some AIDS clinics overseas to stop enrolling new patients in a US-sponsored program that provides lifesaving antiretroviral drugs" in an effort to stem the rising costs of this assistance program. This step has triggered concern among some AIDS advocates "that the Obama administration is curtailing its commitment to a program that provides lifesaving drugs for 2.4 million people and that many view as President Bush's most successful foreign policy legacy. Currently, only about 40 percent of all those who need the drugs worldwide receive them, and demand for the expensive treatments remains high. ... Obama administration officials say they are not capping the number of patients receiving antiretroviral drugs, but they acknowledge that they are seeking to control the ever-rising costs of the program, known as the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, which has grown from $2.3 billion in 2004 to nearly $7 billion this year" (Stockman, 4/11).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.