Table 6. Average costs to patients per year in care, by model.
| Country and model | Transport | Opportunity
cost |
Total cost | % difference
from SOC model (mean total cost per patient) |
Minimum
wage reported for country ‡ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lesotho | |||||
| Facility care with 3-month refills | $11.45 | $32.97 * | $44.42 | $7.10 | |
| Community ART groups with 3-month refills | $2.62 | $13.73 * | $16.34 | -63.2% | |
| Community distribution points with 6-month refills | $4.83 | $13.94 * | $18.77 | -57.7% | |
| Malawi | |||||
| Facility conventional care | $1.59 § | $5.30 † | $6.89 | $1.33 | |
| Facility dispensing with 3-month refills | $1.59 § | $6.63 † | $8.22 | +19.3% | |
| Facility dispensing with 6-month refills | $2.27 § | $3.98 † | $6.25 | -9.3% | |
| Zambia 2 | |||||
| Facility conventional care | $1.67 § | $15.00 † | $16.67 | $4.99 | |
| Facility dispensing with 3-month refills | $1.58 § | $20.00 † | $21.58 | +29.5% | |
| Facility dispensing with 6-month refills | $1.19 § | $9.98 † | $11.17 | -33.0% | |
| Zimbabwe | |||||
| Facility care with 3-month refills | $2.51 | $7.52 | $10.03 | $3.39 ** | |
| Community ART groups with 3-month refills | $0.99 | $4.12 | $5.12 | -49.0% | |
| Community ART groups with 6-month refills | $0.99 | $3.41 | $4.40 | -56.1% |
*Assumed full day for facility visit and ¼ day for DSD interaction at minimum wage for Lesotho.
†Assumed half or full day at minimum wage for country, depending on total number of minutes reported by patients.
‡As reported by each study.
**There is no minimum wage in Zimbabwe. Authors’ calculations based on 2021 “most typical annual salary” reported at https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/zimbabwe.
§Average across entire cohort. In both Malawi and Zambia2, only 23–46% of participants incurred any travel costs. Average cost/participant who did incur travel costs was thus substantially higher than is shown here.