Aids activists have decided to return to court in their fight for access to anti-retrovirals.
This is part of a resolution adopted on Sunday during the Treatment Action Campaign's national congress in Durban, which could see its campaign for anti-Aids drugs becoming more intense.
The resolution, voted for by over 600 people elected to represent TAC branches across the country, calls for a return to its civil disobedience campaign and for a dispute to be declared over negotiations at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac).
Nedlac negotiations for a new government Aids policy that would include the provision of triple anti-retroviral therapy started more than a year ago, but the government refused to sign the negotiated agreement at the last minute.
Subsequent attempts to revive the negotiations led to the TAC suspending a civil disobedience campaign started earlier this year.
"The government has reneged upon every single opportunity it was given, and we have to ask ourselves why," TAC chair Zackie Achmat said. "I will be the first volunteer for civil disobedience if this conference decides to take that route," he added.
The decision to return to civil disobedience was taken despite opposition to the move from the South African Council of Churches and the Congress of South African Trade Unions. Both are firm allies of the TAC.
Last year the organisation made legal history when it won a Constitutional Court battle, forcing the government to provide the anti-Aids drug nevirapine to HIV-positive pregnant women.
That case involved a single dose to a woman in labour, followed by a few drops to her baby within 72 hours of birth - a regimen that costs less than R10. This treatment could halve the risk of an HIV-positive mother passing on the virus to her child.
This time the case will involve lifelong triple therapy, a form of treatment where the cheapest regimen costs in the region of R800 a month.
The congress resolved to start litigation to force the government to come up with a plan to provide anti-retrovirals immediately.