Long-Term Costs and Health Impact of Continued Global Fund Support for Antiretroviral Therapy
2011

Cost and Health Impact of Continued Global Fund Support for Antiretroviral Therapy

Sample size: 3500000 publication 10 minutes Evidence: moderate

Author Information

Author(s): John Stover, Eline L. Korenromp, Matthew Blakley, Ryuichi Komatsu, Kirsi Viisainen, Lori Bollinger, Rifat Atun

Primary Institution: Futures Institute

Hypothesis

What is the cost and health impact of continuing antiretroviral therapy for patients supported by the Global Fund through 2020?

Conclusion

Maintaining antiretroviral therapy for patients will require stable annual costs, with second-line therapy being a major cost driver.

Supporting Evidence

  • 2.3 million patients will still need treatment in 2020.
  • The annual cost of maintaining ART will decline from $1.9 billion in 2011 to $1.7 billion in 2020.
  • Deaths postponed by ART correspond to 830,000 life-years saved in 2011.
  • Continued ART is estimated to save 17.7 million life-years over 2011–2020.

Takeaway

This study looks at how much it will cost to keep people on HIV treatment until 2020 and how many lives will be saved by doing so.

Methodology

The study estimated costs and health impacts based on survival rates and treatment costs for patients on antiretroviral therapy.

Potential Biases

Potential overestimation of patient retention and survival rates due to data collection methods.

Limitations

The analysis does not consider new patients starting treatment and assumes all patients will receive necessary second-line therapy.

Participant Demographics

Patients receiving antiretroviral therapy supported by the Global Fund in low- and middle-income countries.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1371/journal.pone.0021048

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