MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has enough human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) medications until 2024, the Department of Health said after an advocacy group reported a dwindling supply of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs.
In a statement Wednesday evening, the DOH said the country’s current and incoming antiretroviral stocks will be able to cover all people living with HIV until April 2024.
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The health department was responding to the statement of Network Plus Philippines Association Inc. that some people living with HIV reported receiving only “one bottle or even less” of ARV medications from HIV treatment facilities.
According to the advocacy group, concerns over the “dwindling and unstable” supply of ARV drugs started on May 25.
“Up to this date, the PLHIV community continued reporting related issues about their ARV refills and there are anecdotal reports that clients were asked to prepare to buy their own medication,” it said in a statement Tuesday.
ARV drugs reduce mortality and morbidity rates among people living with HIV, and improve their health. Early access to antiretroviral therapy also prevents HIV transmission.
Untreated HIV can progress to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome—the most advanced stage of the disease.
Stocks
The DOH said the reports of low stocks of antiretroviral drugs in HIV treatment facilities, particularly Tenofovir-Lamivudine-Dolutegravir (TLD), could be attributed to the “unprecedented increase” in the use of TLD among PLHIV prior to the targeted full-scale rollout of the transition from their existing regimens.
Treatment-naive patients as well as those who developed adverse drug reactions in their current regimens such as efavirenz were prioritized for transition to TLD in 2020 to 2022, according to the health department.
“However, as the PLHIV 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 said.
The agency assured the public that it is taking necessary measures to ensure adequate supplies of antiretroviral drugs.
Around 58,000 bottles of DOH-procured TLD are expected to arrive in the country by end-June and seen to cover all current patients, estimated new enrollees, and estimated shiftees. Around 243,000 bottles and 292,000 bottles will be delivered by July and September 2023, respectively.
An order of around 146,000 bottles and an early procurement for the next fiscal year will also be facilitated to ensure sufficient supply until 2024.
But for Network Plus Philippines, redistribution of stocks is only a stop-gap solution.
“The network stands to remain as DOH’s partner in finding long-term solutions, but we can no longer settle for intermediary reactive or stop-gap measures to this cyclical problem,” it said.
A total of 14,970 cases were detected from January to December 2022, according to the HIV/AIDS Registry of the Philippines report. In 2021, 12,339 new cases were reported.