I talked last week with Shawn Carney with the State Department of Health. I asked him about living with HIV/AIDS in Indiana, given the UN's call for universal, global access to treatment by 2010. "How are we doing here in Indiana?" I asked him.
The short answer is: not too bad, but it's at a significant price.
There are about 9500 people living with HIV/AIDS in Indiana, and the Department of Health makes treatment available to many of them without direct cost. That's significant, because although the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in Indiana is nothing like it is in South Africa...the cost of treatment is quite high.
For the drugs alone, without medical insurance, Carney estimates a Hoosier living with AIDS would have to spend $18,000 out of pocket each year. That's not including lab-tests, monitoring, special care for other, related health issues.
In raw cost, not taking either insurance OR bulk-purchase discounts the state may get into account, $18,000 a year for 9500 people...means $171,000,000. Now, not all those 9500 people are using state assistance to get treatment. The HIV/STD division of the DoH's budget is only about $20,000,000. Still, it's a staggering amount of money.
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