Georgia offers free Hepatitis C treatment to citizens in occupied regions

Georgia has a unique Hepatitis C treatment program and wants to share its benefits with its "Abkhazian and Ossetian brothers and sisters”.

Georgia’s Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili spoke about his ambition to provide Hepatitis C treatment to people living in Georgia’s breakaway regions while visiting the Rukhi village.

The village is located near the administrative border of Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia region, where the Georgian side is building a $41 million US dollar hospital.

Garibashvili said a medical station would soon open in Zugdidi, western Georgia, where Abkhazians will be able to collect sofosbuvir, an innovative medicine for Hepatitis C, for free. The medicine will be available for Ossetians, too, he added.

"Our brothers and sisters who want to be cured in Abkhazia and South Ossetia [Tskhinvali region], we will create proper conditions for them,” Garibashvili said.

Meanwhile the new treatment program, introduced last month, is believed to make Georgia a Hepatitis C-free country in about five year’ time.

Read more about the Hepatitis C program here.