As of: January 24, 2024, 4:43 p.m
By: Sebastian Horsch
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Germany is fighting a shortage of HIV drugs.
Health Minister Karl Lauterbach hopes for imports – Bavaria is calling for more profound solutions.
Berlin/Munich – In the 80s and 90s, fear of the “deadly epidemic” AIDS was still great.
A lot has happened since then.
An HIV infection is no longer a death sentence.
There are also good ways to protect yourself.
This is also thanks to the active ingredient combination emtricitabine/tenofovir disoproxil, which is used for so-called HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP for short.
Around 40,000 people in Germany currently use such medication for HIV prevention.
But there are currently delivery bottlenecks.
According to manufacturers, delays in production and increased demand are the reasons.
The working group of outpatient HIV doctors therefore fears an increase in HIV infections.
In addition, people who are already infected and are taking active ingredients as part of their therapy are at risk of losing a vital medication.
HIV drugs in short supply in Germany: Federal institute admits “delivery bottlenecks”.
The supply bottleneck database shows “a development towards limited availability of this combination of active ingredients or of the finished medicinal products containing this combination of active ingredients around the turn of the year,” confirmed the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM) when asked by the
Münchner Merkur
.
And the shortage continues.
“The majority of delivery bottlenecks are currently forecast until March or April – a delivery bottleneck until the end of January,” the BfArM continues.
Therefore, “efforts are currently being made by individual authorization holders to increase product quotas or to make product quotas available to the market earlier than originally planned”.
The BfArM hopes that the availability of these drugs will stabilize slightly at the beginning of February.
Karl Lauterbach (SPD), Federal Minister of Health © Bernd von Jutrczenka/dpa
In addition, it is currently being clarified whether there are surplus quotas abroad.
Initial feedback shows that there may be an opportunity to import medicines from the USA.
The Federal Ministry of Health, led by Karl Lauterbach (SPD), announced to our newspaper that it would allow imports and is calling on health insurance companies to cover the additional costs.
Söder's minister is surprised about Lauterbach: Berlin should declare a shortage “immediately”.
Bavaria's Health Minister Judith Gerlach (CSU), however, is calling on the federal government to “immediately” identify a shortage of supplies.
“Bavaria can then take measures to make it easier to import medicines,” says Gerlach to
Merkur
.
“This is how we handled the juices for children containing antibiotics, for example, in May 2023 – and also at the end of 2023 with the medicines containing salbutamol.”
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There have been repeated supply bottlenecks for years.
“There are currently over 500 products affected by a delivery bottleneck in Germany, including antibiotics, anti-diabetics and some cancer drugs,” says Gerlach.
Lauterbach must finally combat the shortage comprehensively and effectively.
“It is difficult for me to understand that, despite these high numbers, things continue to remain so quiet in Berlin,” says Gerlach.