News has come out that the Trump administration is moving to prevent access to PREP in approximately 30 states across the United States with the help of Republicans.
Part of the reason the increase may happen is because the newly minted White House is looking to nix the current form of the Affordable Care Act and implement its own version – referred to as “Trumpcare”.
Thus, access to PREP is threatened by the change in pricing and insurance coverage.
More: Should I take PREP?
Right now, the approximate cost of the HIV prevention medication hovers around $1,500 without insurance. But because of the Affordable Care Act, the cost is much lower.
Should Medicare expansion be eliminated, something being pushed by Mr. Trump and his Republican cohorts, the result means new applicants to PREP will likely be blocked. This change would also negatively impact low income earners.
While still in development, the new bill calls for a fixed sum per person to replace Medicare, and the ACA's cost-sharing assistance would be repealed (meaning gone).
The change may reduce the overall price of health costs, but if ACA gets nixed, a rise in coverage is most certain to occur.
FYI: Between 2012 and 2015, approximately 80,000 American’s started on the prevention medication.
“When PREP was first approved, gay and bisexual men were not using it,” says Noël Gordon Jr., a senior program specialist for HIV prevention & Health Equity at the Human Rights Campaign. “Now, we’ve seen an exponential increase in users.”
Gordon suggests the repeal of the ACA in its current form, replaced by Trumpcare, could be “devastating” as “it has the potential to turn the tide the other direction, where we could potentially see the spread of HIV.”
Gay Pop Buzz conducted a search of the White House Website for more information. It appears the administration has brought back a page for ONAP (Office of National AIDS Policy).
However, at the time of this post, there is no content on the page. To learn more about the potential PREP increases, visit this page from Time Magazine.
h/t: Pink News
