Cost of AIDS care in Mexico: what are its main individual predictors?

BACKGROUND: The Mexican government is offering universal access to antiretroviral (ARV) drugs. The cost of doing so, despite aggressive price negotiation with the pharmaceutical industry, remains high. Even with a low prevalence, about 150,000 Mexicans are estimated to be living with HIV and will require ARV treatment. Estimating the resources needed to fund this gap should consider how patient and provider characteristics affect health care costs. METHODS: Using a sample of patients from 11 facilities in three Mexican cities representing a large proportion of AIDS patients in the country, we developed a fixed-effect model, which by controlling the facilities and individual heterogeneity estimates predicted costs using patient demographic and socioeconomic characteristics as well as physician training. RESULTS: The estimated model explains about 45% of the variation in costs. Additional education is significantly and positively associated with cost. Increasing age is also associated with higher costs. CONCLUSIONS: Socioeconomic status and demographic characteristics explain an important proportion of variation in care costs for AIDS, despite AIDS being such a heterogeneous disease. Such characteristics will need to be taken into account when resource needs are estimated. A priority-setting process considering the principles of equity in the fair distribution of resources is needed to help reduce the social burden of HIV/AIDS in Mexico.