South African activists won an important court ruling yesterday in their campaign to force a reluctant government to help HIV-positive pregnant women save their babies from the virus.
In the 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 Supreme Court.
The AIDS activist group Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), backed by doctors, launched the court action arguing that 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," the TAC national secretary, Mr Mark Heywood, said.
TAC activists and supporters were jubilant at the judgment. No health ministry officials were available for immediate comment and no government officials were present at the court.
Under the ruling, the health department has to return to court by March 31st to show how it will roll out the national nevirapine programme.
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. One in nine South Africans is estimated to be HIV-positive.
A dose of nevirapine - a tablet given to the mother during labour and a teaspoon of syrup to the baby within the first 72 hours after birth - can cut infection rates by up to 50 per cent.
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 B÷hringer 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," Mr Kevin McKenna, B÷hringer Ingelheim's managing director in South Africa, said.