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Anti-Retroviral drugs are providing an important lifeline to people living with HIV. Before the advent of ARVs, the lives of people living with HIV were greatly shortened but they can now live longer more or less normal lives.As such, everyone in need of ARVs should be able to access these drugs at affordable prices without any problems.

The government set up the Aids Fund, administered by the National Aid Council, to spearhead the national response to the HIV/Aids pandemic.

One of NAC’s mandates is to ensure that ARVs are readily available.

However, not everyone in need of ARVs is able to get them through official channels.

It is estimated that the country has 1.3 million people infected by HIV and just half of these are accessing ARVs.

The demand for ARVs has seen a racket involving health workers stealing the essential drugs from public hospitals and selling them to private health facilities and individuals.

According to a report in yesterday’s Chronicle, at least four health workers have already been fired in the Midlands province for stealing and selling ARVs to private pharmacies.

We suspect that the people caught so far are just a handful considering the number of public health institutions giving out the drugs.

This racket must be checked now.

Abuse of ARVs seems to be rampant. Stories have been written of some unscrupulous people using the life-prolonging drugs to fatten their chickens before selling them to unsuspecting members of the public.

The theft and abuse of ARVs, if allowed to continue, will reverse the gains the country has made in the fight against HIV. Because of the government’s response to the HIV pandemic, Zimbabwe has been able to reduce the HIV prevalence rate.

There is a danger that patients buying drugs on the black market might be given drugs which are not suitable for them since people infected by HIV have to undergo different medical tests before they are initiated on the therapy.

Taking the drugs without the requisite medical tests raises the risk of adverse reaction.

Deserving patients at public hospitals also risk failing to access their medication, resulting in them defaulting in treatment.

According to Midlands provincial medical director, Dr Milton Chemhuru, the thefts were causing a shortage of drugs at health institutions.

Questions arise why it seems easy to steal these drugs. The Ministry of Health and Child Care needs to come up with measures that ARVs and indeed any other drugs are not pilfered at its institutions.

We cannot have a situation where a few greedy individuals compromise the country’s health sector just because they want to make a few extra dollars.

One way to kill off this black market is to ensure that all people in need of ARVs get them. Most black markets thrive because of shortage of commodities on the open market. If NAC avails enough drugs, it will kill off illegal trade in ARVs.

The pharmaceutical regulatory body, the Medicines Control Authority of Zimbabwe, also needs to come hard on private pharmacies caught stocking stolen ARVs.

These pharmacies must be deregistered as they are engaging in and promoting unethical behaviour.