A high court judgment ordering anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment of HIV-positive prisoners has erupted into a war of words that could see further medication delays for the 15 inmates involved.
The judgment, which effectively orders the Department of Correctional Services to ensure treatment not only for the 15 prisoners but all who are living with Aids, has wide ramifications for inmates across South Africa.
Although no statistics are available for the exact numbers of HIV-positive people currently incarcerated, a recent controversial study at the Westville Prison in KwaZulu-Natal showed up a 30 percent infection rate among 300 inmates who were voluntarily or anonymously tested.
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Death rates due to "natural" causes in South Africa's prisons have also risen by 30 percent in the past three years, despite a 12 percent reduction in the prison population, leading to suggestions that HIV and tuberculosis are the culprits. These death rates have soared by 500 percent since 1996.
The judgment followed months of failed negotiation attempts In respect of the latest Durban High Court judgment, the Department of Correctional Services has now claimed it has been granted leave to appeal the decision.
But Aids activist group the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has hit back, saying no such order was granted and that the State had yet to even apply for leave to appeal.
An associate group of the TAC, Witwatersrand University's Aids Law Project, won the court judgment last Thursday to secure anti-retroviral treatment for 15 HIV-positive prisoners at Westville Prison.
The court ordered further that all restrictions preventing similarly-affected prisoners from accessing ARVs "be removed with immediate effect".
The court gave Correctional Services officials and health authorities in the province until July 7 to provide an affidavit detailing how they would comply with the court order.
'She has played no substantive role in the case '
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