An expert discussion titled ‘Stopping HIV: Implementing the State Strategy’, which is timed to coincide with World AIDS Day, will be held as part of the business programme of the ‘Healthcare in Russia 2021’ event, which will take place on 1 December 2021 at the Rossiya Segodnya International Multimedia Press Centre. ‘Healthcare in Russia 2021’ is being organized by the Roscongress Foundation and the Health Protection Committee of the Russian State Duma.

“The range of priority tasks in the healthcare industry of Russia, one of the world leaders in numerous significant indicators in the fight against HIV/AIDS, includes improving the expert and social environment to ensure a high quality of life for patients with HIV and the safety of Russians with respect to the HIV infection. The action plan for implementing the State Strategy to Combat the Spread of HIV for the Period until 2030 calls for consistently enhancing coordination at the international, federal, and regional levels as part of this position. Today, we are already properly and effectively implementing global projects with leading national scientific and medical centres, including using the platform of the World Health Organization,” said Alexey Mazus, chief visiting specialist on the HIV infection at the Russian Ministry of Health and the Moscow Department of Health.

In 2020, HIV infections decreased by 25% compared with the previous year, however the epidemiological situation with regard to HIV in Russia remains alarming. At the end of last year, the government established the State Strategy to Combat the Spread of HIV for the Period until 2030, which became a new starting point for policy measures to prevent the spread of this life-threatening infection in the country. As part of the state strategy, the Russian public should be fully provided with high-quality HIV screening, the scale of antiretroviral therapy should also be significantly increased, and the risk of HIV transmission from mother to child should be reduced. Public awareness of the disease should also be increased, among other goals.

The Russian Ministry of Health says that Russia has reached a plateau in terms of HIV infections since the end of last year. A further decrease in the incidence and spread of HIV in Russia would be possible if an HIV vaccine is developed. A progressive solution to this problem will be to take advantage of the experience gained from developing drugs and vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.

During the meeting, experts will discuss what adjustments the pandemic has made to the strategies to prevent the spread of HIV infection in Russia, how to reduce the incidence of the HIV infection and increase the level of HIV detection, what measures the regions can offer for implementing the state strategy, what decisions regulators need to make to simplify and expand HIV patients’ access to antiretroviral therapy and innovative drug technologies, as well as what measures could increase citizens’ awareness of the HIV infection and prevent discrimination against people with HIV.

The ‘Healthcare in Russia 2021’ event will be broadcast live on the website of the Roscongress Foundation’s Healthy Life project: forumhealth.ru.

The partner of the event is GSK.