HIV patients in at least 16 Russian regions are being denied routine tests for viral load and immune status, tests prescribed every six months under national medical guidelines, reports the newspaper Vedomosti. The “Patient Control” advocacy group has documented 40 such complaints since the start of 2025, affecting regions including Samara, Tyumen, Kaluga, Orenburg, Rostov, Leningrad, and Amur, as well as Dagestan, Udmurtia, and Bashkortostan.
The testing shortfall reflects deeper budget constraints hitting Russia’s healthcare system. According to Alexey Kovelenov, chief physician at the Center for Prevention and Control of AIDS, federal subsidies for HIV diagnostics have dropped by 35 percent since 2022, even as the number of patients requiring care has grown by 12.7 percent. In Bashkortostan, officials told patients they received only 23 percent of needed test supplies this year, resulting in annual rather than twice-yearly screenings.
HIV viral load and immune status testing allows doctors to monitor whether patients’ treatment is working and adjust medications accordingly. Without regular monitoring, patients risk developing drug-resistant HIV strains, which can reduce treatment effectiveness not just for individual patients but across the infected population, experts warn. A 2023 peer-reviewed analysis of federal surveillance data found that Russia’s HIV prevalence was climbing by an average of 11 percent each year and was projected to reach roughly 600 cases per 100,000 people by 2025 — one of the highest levels recorded in Europe.