The Democratic Alliance on Sunday questioned why the Department of Public Service and Administration had kept secret the results of a study on the impact of HIV/Aids on the public service.
The Sunday Independent newspaper said the study had found more than 100 000 civil servants were infected with HIV/Aids.
The newspaper quoted Anton Lourens, the general manager of the Public Servants Association, as saying the study corroborated the findings of a similar survey which was given to the Minister of Public Service and Administration, Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi more than 18 months ago.
DA spokesperson Mike Waters said in a statement: ”In 2002 I challenged the minister to release the first report — she refused. She also failed to fulfill one of the recommendations in the report ie: to provide ARVs (anti-retrovirals) to infected public servants.
”This report clearly indicated that skilled and highly-skilled public servants had the highest infection rate and professions such as teachers, nurses and social workers had the highest infection rate.”
The study — undertaken by the University of Pretoria’s Centre for the study of Aids on behalf of the department of social development –predicted that there will be an estimated five to seven million deaths from HIV/Aids between 2000 and 2010.
It also found that the public sector employed more than one million people — of which the majority infected by HIV/Aids are in the 25 to 34 year age groups. The highest number of infections are found in KwaZulu-Natal.
According to the study, school enrolment figures were dropping and this could be attributed to declining fertility rates and to rising infant mortality mainly as a result of HIV/Aids.
Waters said Fraser-Moleketi should explain ”what emergency measures her department is taking to rollout ARVs for public servants”.
He said the study also found that a quarter of a million public servants may die of HIV/Aids by 2012, while from 2000 to 2010 between five- and seven million South Africans would die from Aids.
”The DA has repeatedly warned that by ignoring the consequences of the pandemic, service delivery would be severely undermined as the public service would render itself useless,” Waters said. – Sapa