E-DRUG: South African Activists Win AIDS Drug Case
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[Reuters press release; copied as fair use. NN]
14 December, 2001 10:30 GMT
By Steven Swindells
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African activists won an
important court ruling Friday in their campaign to force a reluctant
government to help HIV-positive pregnant women save their babies from
AIDS.
Pretoria High Court Judge Chris Botha ruled that the government
was obliged to provide the AIDS drug nevirapine to pregnant women.
The government is expected to appeal the 70-page ruling before
the country's Supreme Court.
The AIDS activist group Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), backed
by doctors, had launched the court action, arguing the government had
a duty to offer nevirapine under the constitutional right to health
treatment.
"This is a very important victory, a great step forward. The
judge granted everything that the TAC sought, he ordered that
nevirapine be made available at health facilities across the country,"
TAC national secretary Mark Heywood told Reuters.
No health ministry officials were available for immediate
comment on the ruling and no government officials were present at the
court.
Under the ruling, the health department has to return to court
by March 31 to show how it will roll out the national nevirapine
program.
The government has refused to implement such a scheme at public
hospitals and clinics, citing cost and safety concerns surrounding the
drug.
Between 70,000 and 100,000 babies are born HIV-positive yearly
in South Africa, which has more people living with HIV-AIDS than any
other country in the world, with one in nine of its people estimated
to be HIV-positive.
A dose of nevirapine -- a tablet given to the mother during
labor and a teaspoon of syrup to the baby within the first 72 hours of
birth -- can cut infection rates by up to 50 percent.
The government's approach to the epidemic has been mired in
controversy since President Thabo Mbeki questioned the causal link
between HIV and AIDS and said life-prolonging retrovirals were as
toxic as the condition they were meant to treat.
Germany's Boehringer Ingelheim, which makes nevirapine, has
offered the drug free to the government for five years.
"The offer is still there. If the government decides to move
forward we would be happy to supply the product," Kevin McKenna,
Boehringer Ingelheim's managing director in South Africa, said.
The South African government won a landmark case against 39 of
the world's biggest drug firms this year which opened the way for
Pretoria to import cheaper versions of AIDS drugs, including
antiretrovirals. But Pretoria has not reached an agreement with drug
manufacturers or suppliers to get cheaper drugs."
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