UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik) – The Russian health minister pointed out that HIV treatment programs are fully financed by the government in Russia, which also assists other Eastern European and Central Asian states in their fight against HIV.
"The use of standardized treatment plans, recommended by the WHO [World Health Organization], centralized government purchases, the wide use of generic forms of medicine, and, most importantly, the policy of import substitution, have allowed to lower costs over the course of 2015 by more than two thirds," Skvortsova said at a Wednesday UN General Assembly session dedicated to the fight against HIV and AIDS.
The number of HIV-infected individuals in Russia surpassed 790,000 in 2015. Over 90,000 new HIV cases were registered in the country last year.
An HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) infection gradually leads to AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome), which significantly weakens a person’s immune system, making the infected individual progressively susceptible to opportunistic infections.
Without treatment, the average survival time for an HIV infected person is 9-11 years.
Russia switched to an import substitution policy in mid-2014, after the West imposed several rounds of sanctions against the country, citing its alleged involvement in the Ukrainian internal conflict. Previously imported products are currently being replaced both with Russian substitutes and with goods from countries which have not implemented sanctions against Russia.
