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More power to the people: how Thailand fought HIV/Aids


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More power to the people: how Thailand fought HIV/Aids

By Athaporn Limpanyalers,
Special to The Nation

 

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Dr Jean-Louis Lamboray, co-founder of Constellation, a non-profit organisation focusing on community development, learned about the community-based approach to fight HIV and Aids in the villages of Phayao, a small rural province in northern Thailand.

 

In 2005, the Thai government began providing free antiretroviral therapy to patients with HIV under the Universal Healthcare Coverage (UHC) scheme.

 

 

It was a bold move for the Thai healthcare system, as the prices of antiretroviral drugs were considerably high at the time, raising concerns among health providers that the UHC would soon go bankrupt.

 

But that has not happened so far. The government has managed to sustain both the UHC and patients’ access to antiretroviral therapy -- especially after the Government Pharmaceutical Organization succeeded in developing its own antiretroviral drugs, bringing down the cost of medicine.

 

The story of Thailand’s success in combating Aids and HIV involves patients, communities and civil society groups who stood up to tackle the situation, without waiting for the government to start its own initiatives.

 

It was witnessed by Dr Jean-Louis Lamboray, co-founder of Constellation, a non-profit organisation focusing on community development, while he was running an Aids programme for UNAids and World Bank in Thailand from 1996 to 1998.

 

To his surprise, he learned about the community-based approach to fight HIV and Aids in the villages of Phayao, a small rural province in northern Thailand.

 

“A former World Health Organisation staff told me, ‘you have to go to Phayao. Something is happening there’,” Dr Lamboray recalled in an exclusive interview.

 

Phayao became the province with the highest rate of HIV and Aids reported cases in Thailand, since the first case of Aids was discovered in Thailand in 1984.

 

While the epidemic severely hit people in Phayao at first, its prevalence soon declined rapidly despite the lack of medical resources.

 

The Public Health Ministry’s data at the time, cited by Dr Lamboray in his report to UNAids, showed that HIV prevalence among pregnant women in Phayao decreased from 11 per cent to 4.9 per cent between 1992 and 1997.

 

Among military conscripts, HIV prevalence decreased from 20 per cent to around five to seven per cent in the same period. A survey found that around 66 per cent of male workers revealed consistent condom use when having sex with sex workers.

 

Hearing about the declining spread of the disease, Dr Lamboray spent two years regularly visiting Phayao to try to understand the situation on the ground.

 

“I found people discussing why young women and men died. Many of them sent their girls to school instead of letting them end up in the commercial sex business. They also publicly promoted the use of condoms,” he said.

 

“The conclusion was that when the local community discusses the problem publicly, it could lead to a change in the public. If you don’t discuss it, it won’t exist. Only what is discussed openly exists.”

 

The battle against Aids in Phayao was successful due to the decision-making and participation of the local community.

 

“People, not institutions, ultimately decided whether to adapt their sexual, economic and social behaviour to the advent of Aids. Governmental and nongovernmental organisations can only influence, either constraining or facilitating, people’s responses to HIV and Aids,” he wrote in a report for UNAids in 2000.

 

“Their single most important role is to strengthen the capacity of people to assess how Aids affects their lives, to act if needed, and to learn from their actions. Supporting communities in such a process represents a major challenge to institutions involved.”

 

The findings changed Dr Lamboray’s perspective on the healthcare system. Inspired by the local community in Phayao, he co-founded Constellation with the aim to stimulate local responses where people realise their strengths and find the right practices to fix their own problems collectively.

 

Four years after Dr Lamboray left the province, the UHC scheme was introduced in Thailand, initially without antiretroviral therapy included in the scheme’s benefits package.

 

That led to the rise of a people’s movement led by patients with HIV and Aids, civil society groups and medical experts to push the then-Thai Rak Thai government to include free antiretroviral drugs in the UHC benefits package.

 

It could be said that the availability of free Aids and HIV treatment under the scheme is the result of the people’s strength, their participation in fighting HIV and Aids, and their discussions of the situation openly and publicly.

 

During an exclusive interview, Dr Lamboray spoke about cases of Ebola outbreaks in the Democratic the Republic of Congo in the past decade; none of the outbreaks lasted more than three months and they caused no more than 300 deaths.

 

This is because the authorities “trust” the people and let them decide on the approach to deal with the epidemic, he said, instead of demanding local communities to follow “orders”.

 

“If you base on trust, there are changes,” he said. “Many factors of today’s diseases are related to people’s behaviours. If you want to make the health system effective, it depends on the people’s decision on how they want to deal with their health.

 

The shift of power from the healthcare system to the people is a mechanism to achieve a healthcare system.” 

 

The author is deputy secretary-general of the National Health Security Office

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/opinion/30378384?utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=internal_referral

 

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-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2019-11-16
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I am a bit surprised that Mechai Viravaidya, affectionally known as Dr Condom, does not seem to get a mention in this article. He was very much in the forefront of the Aids campaign here at the time and was effective in propagating the safe sex message at the local level at the time.

 

http://www.mechaifoundation.org/

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Thailand has made considerable progress in fighting the spread of HIV-AIDS, but a lot more needs to be done - particularly in relation to MSM (men who have with men), who in the latest Avert survey account for 44 percent of all new infections.

 

Most of the 6,400 additional cases last year were the result of unprotected sex, estimated to account for around nine out of ten of all new HIV infections.

 

The Avert study provides fascinating snapshot of the ongoing war against HIV-AIDS in Thailand, where it is estimated that early-intervention programmes have helped 10 million people avoid HIV transmission.

 

https://www.avert.org/professionals/hiv-around-world/asia-pacific/thailand

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7 hours ago, rooster59 said:

after the Government Pharmaceutical Organization succeeded in developing its own antiretroviral drugs, bringing down the cost of medicine.

you mean they ask india to produce some cheap generic and call it again ... a thai invention

 

what about PREVENTION ???

 

never a baht left for prevention

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10 minutes ago, justin case said:

you mean they ask india to produce some cheap generic and call it again ... a thai invention

 

what about PREVENTION ???

 

never a baht left for prevention

Thais haven't invented the drugs but they have produced their own very cost effectively. The work by the GPO is amazing and part of an overall strategy to combat HIV/AIDS that brings a great deal of credit to the kingdom. Yes, more needs to be done especially to stop new infections. But the story outlines an interesting community based model that along with action at state level has produced considerable success. 

 

Thailand was facing a grave crisis in the 1990s; anyone who says they can't see any change is talking drivel. 

 

Rooster

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1 hour ago, Jane Dough said:

Thais haven't invented the drugs but they have produced their own very cost effectively. The work by the GPO is amazing and part of an overall strategy to combat HIV/AIDS that brings a great deal of credit to the kingdom. Yes, more needs to be done especially to stop new infections. But the story outlines an interesting community based model that along with action at state level has produced considerable success. 

 

Thailand was facing a grave crisis in the 1990s; anyone who says they can't see any change is talking drivel. 

 

Rooster

Yes.

 

It has been an amazing campaign and has been well recognized for it's effectiveness-full kudos on this as Thailand could have turned into a total disaster zone.

 

Even in the local hospitals and clinics-which sometimes struggle for resources- they have done very well.

 

 

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It must have been really bad in the past as since 2010 in the small village I lived in know of 2 x families all having the disease and know of 2 who have died of it and one was 14 the other 30+. When the young girl was dying I was asked to take her to hospital as no one in the village would take her. They were about to put her in the bay and I said hell no! She sat with dignity in the back seat. I was asked what if she dies in your vehicle? Seriously unbelievable... Poor kid died a few month's later. She was from a poor family. Her mother died (I never new her so did not include her) the girl had 2 younger brothers and a dad. I think aids is still very prelivant. Maybe the deaths are not being reported to keep government figures down. 

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3 hours ago, fantom said:

I am a bit surprised that Mechai Viravaidya, affectionally known as Dr Condom, does not seem to get a mention in this article. He was very much in the forefront of the Aids campaign here at the time and was effective in propagating the safe sex message at the local level at the time.

 

http://www.mechaifoundation.org/

And then there's FHI, that has championed the fight against aids world wide,  including thailand????

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4 hours ago, BritManToo said:

My pal died of AIDS (caught in Thailand) earlier this year.

Can't see there's been any change.

 

No Thai lady I've been with ever asked me (or him) to wear a condom.


 

Full blown AIDS is relatively unusual these days. The meds can control HIV to the point of the infected person being able to lead a normal life.

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1 hour ago, Jip99 said:

Full blown AIDS is relatively unusual these days. The meds can control HIV to the point of the infected person being able to lead a normal life.

This time they didn't.

Downhill from diagnosis to death over a period of a year, where he was only out of his London specialist hospital for a week.

 

@ Justin.

Completely hetero, I used to travel all over SEA with him enjoying the bar scene in the various resorts.

Could just as easily have been me dead, and him alive.

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I could never understand the Thai government cracking down on massage parlor happy ending HJs (a completely risk-free alternative) while endorsing every other sexual activity, no matter how risky, as long as a condom, which is not perfect, is used.  

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On 11/16/2019 at 9:57 PM, BritManToo said:

Downhill from diagnosis to death over a period of a year

To die within a year of diagnosis he had to have caught the virus a long time before and to be sure he “caught it in Thailand “ he would have to have only had sex in Thailand and nowhere else. You’re feeling that “not much has changed “  defies everything that has been learned over the last couple of decades. Do some research and you’ll see what incredible progress has been made.

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