Two of the main points raised by a number of speakers was
- there will be different solutions for different regions – a speaker from India highlighted the need to improve quality of harm reduction interventions, simplify diagnostics in resource poor settings and regulate drug pricing
- the ongoing need for accessible and affordable ARVs– how transparency and fairness in pricing differs significantly across countries (with the same drug costing 30 dollars in one country and 600 dollars in another), and the need for clinicians to create political pressure to drive this change.
Also discussed was the importance of evidence based testing and screening programs, linkage to care and services and improving our reach into hard to reach populations.
The discussion to me highlighted how lucky we are in Australia to have the resources and the access to treatment that we do, particularly around HIV treatment and services and the new Hep C drugs. We will have the option to eliminate Hep C because of our access and drug pricing – other countries will not. There are so many different challenges across different countries and regions – as the conference highlighted, WHO guidelines are clear, but there are implementation challenges. In order to reach 90-90-90-90, hopefully Australia will share ideas, learnings and strategies, along with political and economic pressure, that can contribute to global access to best practice care for PLHIV.
