The Nizhny Novgorod region will receive more than 400 million rubles in three years to fight hepatitis C

April 24, 2024, 5:37 pm

The money will be used to provide patients with antiviral drugs.

The head of the Russian government, Mikhail Mishustin, signed a decree on the allocation of subsidies from the federal budget to Russian regions to co-finance measures “to provide antiviral drugs on an outpatient basis to persons under dispensary observation diagnosed with chronic viral hepatitis C.” The document has been published and entered into force.

According to the order, the government annually allocates 4.5 billion rubles for these purposes in 2024-2026. The Nizhny Novgorod region should receive a total of 403,598,500 rubles during this period. According to experts, the receipt of money may begin by mid-summer – it is necessary to carry out a number of bureaucratic and competitive procedures.

“Thanks to the steps that were implemented in previous years and the allocation of additional budgetary funds, the number of patients who can be cured of hepatitis C in Russia can reach 100 thousand people annually,” says the chief freelance specialist in infectious diseases of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Doctor of Medical Sciences Vladimir Chulanov.

According to Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Lobzin, the statement that treatment of hepatitis C in children can be waited is nothing more than a fallacy. The virus can cause serious harm to a child’s body and lead to disability in adulthood. According to a scientific study, curing hepatitis C in a child aged 3 years requires the least amount of medical care.

According to information from the Interregional Public Organization for Assistance to Patients with Viral Hepatitis “Together Against Hepatitis,” 87 children are registered in the Nizhny Novgorod region: 79 patients aged 3 to 18 years, 8 patients under the age of 3 years. According to epidemiological data, up to 0.2% of the child population may be carriers of antibodies to the hepatitis C virus, which is 1,200 people for the region. This means that many children with hepatitis C have not yet been diagnosed.

— In the Nizhny Novgorod region, treatment of hepatitis C in children is carried out with modern drugs of direct antiviral action with a high safety and effectiveness profile on the basis of the clinical diagnostic department of the State Budgetary Healthcare Institution “Infectious Clinical Hospital No. 23”. In case of laboratory confirmation of infection with the hepatitis C virus (outpatient, on the referral of a pediatrician at the place of residence or in any private laboratory), the legal representative with the child must, by appointment, attend an appointment with an infectious disease specialist at the clinical diagnostic department of this medical institution to fill out an application for therapy. ,” said the chief freelance specialist on infectious diseases in children of the Nizhny Novgorod Ministry of Health, Elena Sidorenkova.

Let us recall that in a recent interview with the Vremya N news agency, Elena Tikhomolova, deputy chief physician of the State Budgetary Healthcare Institution No. 2 and chief freelance specialist of the regional Ministry of Health for infectious diseases, said that today hepatitis C is almost completely curable.