Aids court defeat for South African govt

The South African government’s muddled Aids policy suffered its most serious blow to date today when a court ordered it make a key drug available to HIV-positive pregnant women Aids activists cheered and embraced after the landmark decision to force the government to distribute the drug nevirapine was read by Pretoria High Court Judge Chris Botha.

‘‘We’ve made history today,’’ said a beaming Mark Heywood, secretary of the Treatment Action Campaign, the Aids activists group which filed the lawsuit together with a group of doctors.

The lawsuit had been the first major legal challenge to change the government’s policy on Aids medication.

In a country devastated by Aids, about 24% of the pregnant women in South Africa are HIV positive.

The availability of the drug could save as many as 50,000 babies next year, doctors said.

Studies show nevirapine can reduce the transmission of the virus from mother to child during labour by up to 50%.

A German pharmaceutical company has offered to distribute the drug for free, but the government argued its safety has not been proven and had therefore restricted its distribution to a handful of pilot sites.

The policy of rejecting a free drug, recommended by the World Health Organisation, puzzled the public and the court.

Activists have publicly questioned whether there is a connection between the sluggish pace of the government’s program to combat the disease and President Thabo Mbeki’s comments casting doubt on the link between HIV and Aids.

Mbeki has said poverty and malnutrition are also to blame for the spread of the epidemic.