A detailed costing of Cryptococcal meningitis prevention and treatment in Botswana

Cryptococcal meningitis is a severe fungal infection that mainly affects people with HIV and AIDS and results in 200,000 deaths annually. Current methods of treatment involve long hospital admissions and expensive medication which can be a challenge for countries with limited resources. The development of short-course treatments and an inexpensive test (cryptococcal antigen lateral flow assay – CrAg LFA) that can detect cryptococcal infection before people become ill enables preventive therapy to be given and could reduce overall costs, as well as saving lives. 

I will investigate the current cost of cryptococcal meningitis treatment in Botswana and determine the costs of the new short-course treatment and prevention strategies. 

This information will help policy makers in Botswana decide whether the new treatment and prevention strategies should be implemented as part of the country’s government-funded HIV treatment programme.

This grant was awarded under the scheme’s previous name of Master’s Fellowship in Public Health and Tropical Medicine.