Burma's AIDS crisis at breaking point

Burma's AIDS crisis at breaking point
Only 1 in 8 people in Burma are receiving treatment for HIV and Aids, according to shocking new figures.

It’s estimated that there are 240,000 people with HIV in Burma, half of whom urgently need antiretroviral treatment (ART) drug treatment if they are to survive according to doctors. In 2010, it is reckoned that less than 30,000 of these people were receiving the drugs.
Burma is poorest country in southeast Asia, with one third of people below the poverty line and the Government only able to pay for around 30 per cent of all healthcare. The reality is that few of the Aids and HIV sufferers will ever be able to afford the treatment, which the charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), says costs just $30 a month.
"We see patients crawling in, some lethargic and near death, some trying to drag themselves in," said Dr Maria Guevara, medical co-ordinator at MSF, who are the largest provider of ART in Burma. "As doctors, to be faced with that and have to say we can't give them treatment because they don't meet our criteria; it's tragic. We are having to say no to people we know will just get sicker and die."
As if this isn’t bad enough, Burma’s tuberculosis in Burma is nearly three times the global average, partly because it attacks HIV patients in particular.
MSF had been hoping that the  Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria would give them the funds to treat an extra 46,500 people - but those hopes were dashed last year when the fund announced it was short of cash.
"The fact they have withdrawn the round is a true failure," said Guevara. "Understandably, there are issues economically and internationally, but the commitment is still there. The pledges were made. By doing this they didn't just fail themselves, they failed everyone they made commitments to. And that means lives."
As a result, the ART drugs are being rationed by doctors. Already death rates are up by 25 per cent on last year.