Free treatment at hospitals was withdrawn in April 2004 from failed asylum-seeking adults, including pregnant women, not already receiving treatment.
Campaigners hope to persuade the health select committee, which is reviewing the policy at the end of the month, to back the inclusion of HIV treatment on the list of sexually transmitted infections that are exempt from the policy.
However, they warn the situation will deteriorate further if plans to extend the ban to primary care also become policy, as the Government proposed in a consultation paper last summer.
Ruth Lowbury, executive director of the Medical Foundation for AIDS and Sexual Health, said that while HIV tests would still be available free of charge to failed asylum seekers, pregnant women usually accessed the antenatal screening programme, which includes the test, through their GP.
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