Puerto Rico

I guess I should let it go but I'm still annoyed that CDC and JAMA officials treated the roll out of new HIV incidence estimates like Steve Jobs launching a new iPhone.

This product launch offers "consumers" scarcely any new fun features or software improvements, and if we allow the alarming new data to fall into oblivion, it will also fail to give the fight against HIV/AIDS any meaningful utility.

For months, AIDS advocates called for the public release of the data, which CDC admitted this weekend it had finalized in October 2007. An earlier release might have given the Bush administration second thoughts about requesting a $1 million decrease for CDC's domestic HIV prevention programs; spurred presidential candidates to talk more readily about HIV/AIDS in the U.S.; persuaded media pundits and debate moderators to quiz candidates on plans to end the epidemic; led Congress to pass even one of the dozen domestic HIV prevention bills languishing on Capitol Hill or motivated appropriators to finally boost HIV prevention funding or end long-held restrictions on how funding can be used.

No, instead the cult of embargoes prevailed, with no account to the burgeoning public health crisis the very paper in question describes.  read more »

According to a press release issued by the Office of the Governor of Puerto Rico "There are currently six "new" medications that have been proven effective in treating these types of patients (HIV/AIDS patients) but are not currently covered under the Government Health Insurance Plan (GHIP, commonly referred to as Reforma), because the committees that evaluate and select new medications have not met since the year 2000." These review committees are part of the Puerto Rico Health Insurance Administration (PR-HIA, known by its Spanish acronym ASES) that manages the "Reforma" public health plan.

ASES is a public corporation that was created in 1993 to manage Puerto Rico's Public Health Insurance system. The Secretary of Health of Puerto Rico, Dr. Rosa Perez Perdomo is a member of the Board of Directors of ASES which has oversight for the evaluation committee. http://www.gobierno.pr/ASES/BaseLegal/
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