Kenya HIV patients live in fear as US aid freeze strands drugs in warehouse

The health clinic where Alice Okwirry collects her HIV medication in Kenya's capital Nairobi has been rationing supplies of antiretrovirals to one-month refills since the US government froze foreign aid.On the outskirts of the city, meanwhile, millions of life-saving doses sit on the shelves of a warehouse, unused and unreachable.The clinic is a half hour's drive from the warehouse, but for Okwirry, they may as well be an ocean apart.Without US funding, distribution from the warehouse, which stocks all US government-donated HIV medicine to Kenya, has ceased, leaving supplies of some drugs worryingly low, according to a former USAID official and a health official in Kenya.The 90-day foreign aid freeze, ordered by President Donald Trump, has upended the global supply chain for medical products to fight HIV and other diseases. It is also blocking the distribution of drugs that long ago reached their destination countries."I was just seeing death now coming," said 50-year-old Okwirry who was diagnosed with HIV in 2008 and has a 15-year-old daughter, Chichi, who is also HIV-positive.Okwirry used to receive six-month supplies of ARVs from the clinic but now can only get one month."I told Chichi: what about if you hear the drugs are doomed?" Okwirry said, growing emotional. "She told me: Mom, I'll be leaning on you."No moneyThe State Department issued a waiver last month exempting funding for HIV treatment from the freeze.But the USAID payments system in Kenya is down after the cuts, meaning contractors who implement the programmes cannot be paid, said Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin, who was the deputy head of communications for USAID, East Africa, until resigning on 3 February in protest at the dismantling of the agency."Projects are left wondering: 'Well, how am I going to resume activities if you're not paying me money?" he said. "The waivers that have been given are really waivers on paper."In Kenya, officials in Washington have not authorised the release of money required to distribute the US$34 million worth of medicine and equipment at the warehouse, he added.According to a Kenyan government document seen by Reuters, about US$10 million is needed for that distribution. The Mission for Essential Drugs and Supplies, the Christian charity that runs the warehouse, supplies drugs to some 2 000 clinics nationwide, its website says.Knowles-Coursin told Reuters the commodities at the warehouse include 2.5 million bottles of ARVs, 750 000 HIV test kits and 500 000 malaria treatments.Kenya has the seventh-largest number of people living with HIV in the world, at around 1.4 million, according to World Health Organization data. The President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the main US vehicle for funding HIV treatment, supplies some 40% of Kenya's HIV drugs and supplies.A health official in Kenya, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter, said stocks of two critical HIV treatments, Dolutegravir and Nevirapine, were low but did not know exactly how much remained nationwide.

Kenya HIV patients live in fear as US aid freeze strands drugs in warehouse

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Namibian Sun 2025-05-01

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Kenya HIV patients live in fear as US aid freeze strands drugs in warehouse

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Namibian Sun 2025-05-01

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