CHENNAI: Fifty-year-old Kamala (name changed), a woman living with HIV, did not want to stand at the pharmacy counters meant for general patients at government hospitals to get drugs for her other health problems as she did not want to be identified by her condition. To buy any medication, an HIV positive person is required to carry their Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) notebook with them, which is an easy giveaway about their condition, leading to stigma and ostracisation.
Now, things like this are set to change with Health Department passing orders to distribute these medicines also at Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) clinics again. When she was made to wait at government hospitals pharmacy counters she stopped even taking vitamin tablets that the State has been providing for people like her as a substitute for micronutrients. Not only she, but many people living with HIV who cannot afford to buy medicines from private pharmacies also stop taking tablets for other health problems, say representatives of People Living with HIV (PLHIV).
To find a solution, the department has now passed orders to issue opportunistic infection drugs at ART clinics, from where these people already get ART drugs. P Kousalya, president, Positive Women Network, told Express, “People living with HIV have to take ART notebook to the general pharmacy counter in government hospitals to get medicines for opportunistic infections, including tuberculosis, fever, skin allergies and indigestion.”
Meanwhile, a health department official said adequate drugs are not stocked for these patients in many hospital pharmacies. So, many skip taking the tablets, putting their lives in danger. They are made to wait in general patients counters for long. This might be risky as they are vulnerable to other infections due to poor immunity.
PLHIVs get their opportunistic infection drugs monthly once from general pharmacies. Now, medical officers at ART clinics will get these drugs from heads of the hospital or health institutions concerned and give them to these people at ART clinics, an official said.