The Massachusetts legislature passed a spending bill giving the state’s AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP) a $2.4 million increase in September, enough of an increase to preclude the imposition of a waiting list until the end of the current Ryan White fiscal year in March. “We are still looking at a problem next year after March,” said Annette Rockwell, director of the state’s ADAP, known in Massachusetts as the Health Drug Assistance Program (HDAP). “We are looking at a $7.5 million shortfall next year.” The Massachusetts HDAP, like other ADAPs, has been confronting rising cost and utilization rates in recent years, increases that have outstripped available funding for the program. HDAP enrollment more than doubled during the past two years, jumping from 1,538 clients in 2002 to 3,224 in 2004. At the same time, the state legislature reduced the Medicaid eligibility criteria for HIV patients who were able to enroll in the program under a special 1115 AIDS waiver, a move that forced about 100 HIV patients off Medicaid and onto HDAP. As a result, officials were considering an HDAP waiting list before the legislature approved an additional $2.4 million for the program during a special legislative session in September.