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July 30, 2010

N.J. restores drug funds for low-income HIV/AIDs patients

NewJerseyNewsroom.com: "Alaigh said that the state learned this month that it will receive approximately $5 million in additional rebates recently negotiated from pharmaceutical companies and that — along with newly available federal AIDS grant funding will enable the department to automatically transfer those no longer eligible for the ADDP program into the new program called the Temporary AIDS Supplemental Rebate and Federal Assistance Program.

"The National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors recently convened a crisis task force which successfully negotiated additional rebates from pharmaceutical companies in response to cost containment efforts that many states were forced to make.

"In addition, New Jersey expects to receive a share of a new federal ADDP grant program announced earlier this month by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services."

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Please help my son and other HIV infected Ohioians who are being cut off from their HIV meds in Ohio due to a deficit in funding and budget. He died once already with 5 plus organ failure. He was on a ventilator and the University Hospital Miracle teams brought him back to life organ by organ. He has been left with organ damage such as cardiomyopathy, pulmonary hypertension, renal damage, etc. His counts are just a little up from the 200 CD4 count of advanced stage AIDS again. He will die without his meds (Atripla)which would cost $900 to $1400 monthly. He has pre-existing conditions and cannot get insurance and cannot get a job due to his now bad credit, time lapse in his job history due to illness, and today's tough job market. Not to mention the stigma of this disease that our state has found the people or this disease and their lives dispensable. They are human beings who are loved and productive. The disease does not discriminate. It hits men, women, and children of all nationalities, genders, lifestyles, religions, etc. When you cut state and federal budgets, how can you justify cutting people's lifes. Will cutting off chemo treatments to cancer patients be next? Or is it just because this disease has still such a negative stigma to it, a continuing society engrained residual of the earlier suffering years of Ryan White. Not even Social Security Disability help them. Is our country now an animalistic country of "survival of the fittest". How low we have sank as to respect for human life!! I am ashamed of our State and those in our government who have made such an inhumane decision. Please, anyone out there help us before it is too late!!! Contact our local media in Cincinnati, Columbus, our Governor Strickland, our President Obama,our AVOC Agency in Cincinnati, myself, the drug companies,etc. Help us to get funding like you did. Your state and others may be next. And if we allow our politicians and others get by with this and set a precedent that lives of people with HIV are dispensible, we truly will see this spread to other diseases as well. Many good people will be lost. Our nation seems to be able to raise funding by the millions for AIDS Internationally (Africa, etc.), but what about our own Americans as well. Many Americans will die. The medicine is the only thing that keeps them alive. I don't want anyone to watch their loved one die organ by organ when it is so preventable by keeping the treatment and drugs they need ongoing. My son will not survive the next time his counts plummet, which it is guaranteed they will without treatment and his meds. Please in the name of God help us with any legitimate contacts, agencies, corporations, drug companies, programs, funding, politicians, etc. May God Help Us All!!! Rebecca at Whittorj@aol.com