Authors: Zoe Ward, Jack Stone, Chrissy Bishop, Viktor Ivakin, Ksenia Eritsyan, Anna Deryabina, Andrea Low, Javier Cepeda, Sherrie L Kelly, Robert Heimer, Robert Cook, Frederick L Altice, Taylor Litz, Assel Terlikbayeva, Nabila El-Bassel, Denis Havarkov, Alena Fisenka, Anelia Boshnakova, Andrey Klepikov, Tetiana Saliuk, Tetiana Deshko, and Peter Vickerman.
HIV incidence is increasing in eastern Europe and central Asia, primarily driven by injecting drug use. Coverage of antiretroviral therapy (ART) and opioid agonist therapy are suboptimal, with many people who inject drugs (PWID) being incarcerated. We aimed to assess whether use of monies saved as a result of decriminalisation of drug use or possession to scale up ART and opioid agonist therapy could control HIV transmission among PWID in eastern Europe and central Asia.
