AIDS drugs ‘could save 1.7m lives’

THE lives of more than 1.7 million HIV-infected South Africans could be saved by 2010 if the government made AIDS drugs available immediately, according to a leaked report.

The study was compiled by officials from the health and finance departments earlier this year to determine the cost and impact of a national AIDS drug programme. The report, completed five months ago but not yet released, was leaked by the Treatment Action Campaign, an AIDS activist group warring with the government over its sluggish approach to combating the AIDS pandemic.

More than five million South Africans are infected with HIV, the highest number of infected people in the world. The government has resisted beginning a wide-scale programme to distribute medicine to those infected, and some government officials have questioned the effectiveness of the drugs, which have turned AIDS from a death sentence to a chronic disease in the developed world.

The leaked report said 733,000 lives would be saved by 2010 if half the number of those in need of AIDS drugs were treated. About 1.7m lives could be saved if drugs were rolled out nationally, the Cape Times reported.

About 1.8m additional children will lose a parent by 2010 if the drugs are not provided. The number could be reduced by 860,000 if the government made the drugs available.