Editorial: B.C. exemplary in AIDS fight

published on July 22, 2015 in Times Colonist

British Columbia’s record of combating AIDS has been recognized internationally, and its policies are being adopted by countries around the world, but not by the Canadian government. Ottawa should create and implement national strategies on HIV/AIDS, using B.C.’s policies as a template.

The fight against the virus is spearheaded by the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS. When the centre was opened in 1992, B.C. had the worst AIDS rate in the country — a B.C. resident was dying from the disease almost every day. Now, B.C.’s infection rate is far below the national average.

That’s the result of B.C.’s aggressive Treatment as Prevention policy, pioneered by the centre’s director, Dr. Julio Montaner. HAART (Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy) costs $15,000 per patient per year, but it’s free to B.C. patients, at a cost of $100 million a year. That seems like a large sum, but the cost to society, financially and otherwise, would be much higher without the treatment.

The AIDS pandemic has already proved costly throughout the world; unchecked, it would be devastating. Proper treatment means those infected with the virus can lead normal lives and the transmission rate is greatly reduced. The B.C. experience offers hope to those countries where AIDS is rampant, and where no one is untouched by the disease.

It’s not a time to be complacent, at home or abroad. It takes a concerted effort, and that effort is growing around the world. The United Nations aims to reduce AIDS to a sporadic disease by 2030, following a strategy based on B.C.’s policies. That strategy has been adopted by countries that include the U.S., China, France, Brazil, Spain, Argentina and Panama — but not Canada.

In fact, says Montaner, who has been appointed as a special adviser to the UN, Ottawa is hampering the effort by failing to show national leadership. He said the federal government has allowed the standard of treatment to vary across the country, even allowing some provinces to require patients to make co-payments for therapy, which, he says, is a barrier to treatment.

Ottawa has been willing to form national strategies on SARS and Ebola, but not on HIV/AIDS, which afflicts thousands of Canadians.

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Treatment as Prevention®

Julio Montaner

BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS

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Editorial: B.C. exemplary in AIDS fight

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