Air fare tax to help fund HIV care

Travelling abroad by air? You will soon be required to pay some extra cash on every ticket to fund HIV care.

With over 700,000 Kenyans in need of anti-retroviral drugs, the government on Wednesday admitted that it was no longer feasible to depend entirely on donor funds.

Public Health and Sanitation minister Beth Mugo told a news conference that her ministry had prepared a Cabinet memorandum on a proposal to raise funds through a special air fare tax.

The memorandum should be ready for presentation to the Cabinet in two months.

“We are discussing the tax because donor funds will not go on forever. We cannot entrust the health of our people to donors,” Mrs Mugo said.

The funds raised will mainly go into providing second line ARVs as well as prevention of mother-to-child transmission.

There have been concerns that some donors, in particular the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar) were being withdrawn.

In addition, the government missed out on the Global Fund’s Round 8 and 9 while MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières) wants to hand over the Aids patients under their care to the government as they prepare to phase out.

Also, in the last two months, there has been an acute shortage of male condoms in the country, which the government is attributing to increased usage and bureaucracy in procurement.

Condom usage increased from 8 million a month some time last year to 20 million at present.

There is currently a shortage of 8 million male condoms a month, necessitating the government to order an emergency supply of 45 million condoms.

The consignment will arrive on April 10 according to the Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation.

The government provided Sh900 million for Aids programmes in the current financial year, an amount that many consider negligible.