Economic aspect of HIV/AIDS control and injecting drug use in Indonesia

Abstract

The HIV epidemic in Indonesia is among the fastest growing in Asia, and limited funding is available for HIV/AIDS control. This raises a number of important policy questions, about the adequacy of the level of available funding, the appropriateness of its use, and its financial sustainability. This paper puts these questions in context of the present Indonesian health system. The Indonesian health policy response to HIV/AIDS faces a number of challenges. The nature of the Indonesian HIV epidemic (increasing overall prevalence, with different epidemic profiles); the characteristics of the Indonesian health system (decentralized policy making, low and inequitable funding), and the low and highly internationalized funding of HIV/AIDS control (resulting in low service coverage and questions of sustainability) draw out a very specific health environment of HIV/AIDS. Economic analyses in health are instrumental to guide policy makers on the best use of scarce resources, and holds as such also large potential in this context. However, very little information on the costs and effects of HIV/AIDS control in Indonesia is available, and we call for a broader application.