A breakthrough pricing agreement announced today at the 2018 International AIDS Conference will significantly reduce the cost of diagnostic testing for HIV/AIDS, hepatitis and cervical cancer for millions of people in low- and middle-income countries.
The agreement has been made between MedAccess, an initiative established by CDC to increase patient access to life-changing medical supplies in Africa and South Asia, and diagnostic testing manufacturer Hologic.
Viral load testing improves patient care, helps prevent the spread of disease, and reduces healthcare spending. Although the World Health Organisation recommends this testing as a gold standard in HIV care, today only 56 percent of people living with HIV have routine access to it, while HPV is the leading cause of cervical cancer. Increasing availability of testing will increase the speed and accuracy with which patients can be evaluated and the savings generated will allow governments to scale up access for patients.
Under the agreement, MedAccess will underwrite the risk of supplying the tests in uncertain markets, allowing Hologic to introduce viral load testing to national government testing programmes at a significantly reduced rate. It is anticipated that the agreement will save public sector purchasers over $50m over the next four years and beyond, with at least five countries in sub-Saharan Africa expected to introduce this technology in 2018.
Find out more
- See the full press release from MedAccess and partners here
- Find out more about MedAccess here
- MedAccess partnered with Unitaid, the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the African Society for Laboratory Medicine (ASLM), and the government of Zambia.
