Replies to LegCo questions

LCQ6: Medical services for AIDS patients and HIV infected individuals

Following is a question by the Dr Hon Yeung Sum and a written reply by the Secretary for Food and Health, Dr York Chow, in the Legislative Council today (April 16):

Question:

Will the Government inform this Council:

(a) of the medical services currently provided by the authorities to Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) patients and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infected individuals; and

(b) as I have learnt that the medication and therapies currently used by the authorities in treating AIDS are more effective than those used in the past in terms of delaying HIV infected individuals' progress to AIDS and lengthening the survival time of AIDS patients, whether it has assessed if the existing services are adequate to meet the demand at present and in the next few years; if the assessment result indicates that they are inadequate, whether it has any plan to allocate more resources to ensure that the service quality can be maintained?

Reply:

Madam President:

Both the Department of Health (DH) and Hospital Authority (HA) are providing medical services to Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) patients and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infected individuals. Services span from treatment and prevention of incidental infection, antiviral therapy, regular blood testing to monitoring the treatment progress and psychological support provided by a multi-specialist support team.

The application of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) or "cocktail therapy" was introduced to Hong Kong in 1997, and has proven to be successful in achieving clinical benefits and good public health outcomes. Studies indicated that the accessibility and effectiveness of medical services for AIDs patients and HIV infected individuals in Hong Kong are comparable to the best standards in developed western countries. The medical services as described are accessible to all local patients, and there has been a 80-90% reduction in AIDS mortality and morbidity rate since HAART was introduced.

With the accumulation of patients from improved survival and the rising HIV epidemic among men who have sex with men, an increasing number of HIV and AIDS patients are under the care of the above services. Such patients increased by about 15 to 20% every year from 2005 to 2007. The annual drug cost for treating each patient was approximately HK$100,000. To meet the increase in demand, the Government has allocated an extra HK$30 million and HK$12 million to DH and HA respectively in 2008/09 for the additional drugs, manpower and laboratory tests required.

The Government will continue to monitor the situation closely and ensure that sufficient resources are made available to provide medical services for HIV infected people and AIDS patients.


Ends/Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Issued at HKT 12:19

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