Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report - Thu, 7 Feb 2002
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Mbeki's State of the Nation Address Not Expected to Include Discus-
sion of HIV/AIDS
Political observers expect that South African President Thabo Mbeki's
state of the nation address scheduled for tomorrow will not include
any mention of the "key challenge" of HIV/AIDS, Reuters reports. They
expect Mbeki, who is thought to have "silently dropped his hardline
resistance to the use of antiretroviral drugs" to reduce vertical HIV
transmission, to nevertheless "remain mute" on the subject during the
speech, which will mark the opening of the 2002 session of the South
African parliament. Although he may no longer personally oppose the
drugs, which he once called "too expensive and potentially danger-
ous," Mbeki is not expected to "publicly reverse" his position on an-
tiretrovirals any time soon. However, the omission "should be seen as
good news" by AIDS activists who do not want to "force Mbeki into an
embarrassing climbdown," Reuters reports (Boyle, Reuters, 2/6). Ac-
tivists recently won a lawsuit seeking to require the national health
system to provide nevirapine to all HIV-positive pregnant women to
reduce the risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission. However, the
government is appealing the decision, citing concerns over judicial
involvement in matters of national policy (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Re-
port, 2/1).
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The Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report is published for kaisernetwork.org,
a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, by National
Journal Group Inc. � 2002 by National Journal Group Inc. and Kaiser
Family Foundation. All rights reserved.
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