HIV patients protest over drug shortage; health ministry says adequate stocks available

People living with HIV protesting in front of the NACO office in Delhi.

A group of HIV patients have been sitting on protest in front of the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) office in Delhi for almost a week, claiming non-availability of drugs essential for their treatment at government centres.

“We are sitting here in front of the NACO office since July 21 protesting against the shortage of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs given to HIV patients. This shortage is not just in the national capital but pan-India,” a protestor who is part of Delhi Network of Positive People (DNP+) told Moneycontrol.

The protestors alleged that the shortage started after a company that had won the tender to supply antiretroviral drugs was found to be blacklisted last year.

NACO centrally procures ARV medicines for people living with HIV as per national guidelines. Nidhi Kesarwani, director, NACO didn’t take questions on the blacklisted bidder and allegations of shortage of drugs in the antiretroviral therapy (ART) centres.

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“Since March 2022, in Delhi and pan-India, there is shortage and stock-out of (ARV drug) Dolutegravir (DTG) 50 mg, paediatric medicine, second line and third line ARV,” said a person living with HIV.

Another person living with HIV, a woman, said ART centres would earlier provide enough medicines for a month or even more but the situation has now changed. “We are being turned away from the centres because the drug is unavailable. How do I manage? Not taking the medicine would only worsen my condition,” she said.

The protestors said ART centres claimed that there was a shortage of the medicines at Delhi’s big hospitals like Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital and Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital.

“These two hospitals faced stock-out of drug DTG on July 20 and 21 and the patients living with HIV returned empty-handed. In AIIMS and Safdarjung, the drug DTG has been given for 10 days,” a protestor said, referring to the capital’s two premier government-run hospitals, All India Institute of Medical Sciences and Safdarjung Hospital.

A senior NACO official met with the protesting persons and updated them about the situation. “They were told to jointly work with state AIDS control societies and NACO for the availability of drugs at those few ART centres that were facing a temporary short supply,” an official said.

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Centre denies drug shortage

Meanwhile, Bharti Pawar, the Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare in Loksabha said that there is no shortage of any ARV drug.

“The fresh supply orders for procurement of the next lot of several drugs have already been placed. Individual ART centres may have this issue at times but the medicines are immediately relocated from nearby centres,” a health ministry official said.

“There is adequate stock nationally for around 95 percent PLHIV (people living with HIV) in the country who are on first and second line ARV regimens like Tablet TLD (Tenofovir+ Lamivudine+ Dolutegravir) and other ARV regimens,” the health ministry official added.

Meanwhile, the Central Medical Services Society, a procurement agency under the health ministry, has been asked to supply the first lot of the drugs at the earliest.

Free medicine for 14.5 lakh HIV patients

India is among very few countries that provides free ARV medicines for lifelong treatment of more than 14.5 lakh PLHIV through 680 ART centres under its National AIDS Control Programme (NACP), which is fully funded by the Union government.

“The mainstay of treatment for more than 85 percent PLHIV is Tablet TLD (a fixed-dose combination of three antiretroviral drugs), for which there is sufficient stock nationally to last more than three months,” the official said.

DTG 50mg is required for around 50,000 PLHIV who are either on alternate first, second or third-line regimens, or those with TB co-infection, the official said.