The Treatment Action Campaign’s (TACs) chairperson, Zackie Achmat, was ”cautiously optimistic” ahead of Saturday’s meeting between his organisation and the government’s National Aids Council.
The first-ever meeting between the TAC and the council, scheduled for May, was postponed because of Walter Sisulu’s funeral.
”There are three items on the agenda. These are the TAC’s suspended civil disobedience campaign, the antiretroviral programme and the costs implications thereof, and lastly the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) process and what was agreed upon last year,” Achmat said on Friday.
He said the TAC was planning for Saturday’s 10am meeting with the chairperson of the National Aids Council, Deputy President Jacob Zuma, at the Union Buildings.
Achmat said the TAC had hoped that the government would have received the costing report on the roll-out of antiretroviral drugs, but government spokesperson Joel Netshitenzhe said on Thursday this would only be before cabinet in ”three to four weeks time”.
”The responsibility of the continuing rate of death is the absence of a government programme, but we are cautiously optimistic,” said Achmat.
In February 2000 the government launched the National Aids Council, made up of representatives from government, business, civil society and the medical sector. Technical task teams were established to advise the council on specific policy issues. – Sapa