Durban, Aug 03: A South African AIDS lobby group said today that it will take the government to court for its failure to provide anti-aids drugs in a country where nearly 1,000 people die every day from the disease. "Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) will pursue litigation for a national treatment and prevention programme," TAC spokeswoman Siphokazi Mthathi told newspersons.

The announcement came ahead of the four-day South African AIDS Conference 2003 opening in this eastern coastal city this evening.
If the legal action goes ahead, it would be the second time TAC has challenged government aids policies in court. The lobby group won a high court order 16 months ago, forcing the state to provide anti-retroviral drugs to pregnant women.

That order is the subject of controversy at the moment, since South Africa's Medicines Control Council (MCC) is threatening to ban the anti-retroviral drug nevirapine, used in mother-to-child transmission prevention.

Mthathi said a global petition, launched by the Washington-based Elizabeth Glaser Paediatric AIDS Foundation, would be presented at the aids conference to protest the threat to ban the drug.
Bureau Report