To plan to care for its AIDS patients in the future, China needed to assess how much it had been spending to treat HIV. Chinese and U.S. researchers — including Center Associate Director Gerald F. Kominski — examined actual expenditures under the free China CARES program, as well as factors influencing costs for patients in rural China after antiretroviral treatment has begun. 

Findings: Authors report expenditures, noting that antiviral drugs made up most of the total costs of treatment. They also conclude that initiating retroviral treatment earlier in patients with HIV will reduce costs of treating adverse side effects and opportunistic infections in people with AIDS.