Supporting inclusion of anti-retroviral drugs in the national health insurance plan
SHOPS Plus is supporting the Dominican Republic to strengthen the sustainability of its HIV response, including mobilizing domestic resources to finance it. One promising strategy for mobilizing private resources to finance the response is including antiretroviral drugs in the benefit package of Seguro Familiar de Salud, the national health insurance plan. The inclusion of these drugs in the benefit package would shift financing of the treatment from the Ministry of Health to the Social Security Treasury, which is funded directly by contributions from employees, employers, and the government. This would free up the ministry's resources to finance other HIV response priorities like prevention. The project is currently assisting the superintendent of health and labor risks in advocating for this change and, once approved, will support the drafting of a plan and timeline that details how each stakeholder affected by the resolution can support its implementation. Finally, SHOPS Plus will provide technical assistance, as needed, to institutions as they implement the reform.
Learn more about HIV and health financing.