Fifteen inmates of Durban’s Westville prison have gone to court to force the prison to provide them with HIV/Aids treatment, including anti-retroviral (ARVs) drugs.
According to papers they have filed in the Durban High Court, 78 inmates of the Medium B prison have died of Aids-related diseases in the past year.
The application, set down for argument in the Durban High Court this week, was adjourned until May 30. The Aids Law Project, attached to Wits University, brought the application against Westville prison and the national departments of health and correctional services.
One of the applicants is currently laid up in a high-care unit at the prison’s medical facility.
The Aids Law Project argues that the lives of prisoners who have died of Aids could have been saved if the government had fulfilled its legal and constitutional obligations to provide anti-retroviral treatment to prisoners with CD4 counts of below 200 cells per cubic millimetre of blood.
Michelle Govender, a researcher at the law project, said that a potential applicant with a low CD4 count had been “given medical parole in March and had died a week later”.
However, there appeared to be some movement by the prison authorities. Another applicant with a particularly low CD4 count was receiving anti-retroviral treatment after being admitted to the prison hospital’s high-care unit following a dramatic deterioration in his health, while three others had started pre-treatment counselling, Govender said.
Minister of Correctional Services Ncgonde Balfour’s office has issued a statement calling the action “opportunistic”, while the various respondents have yet to file notices of opposition.
Govender said that the Aids Law Project had met the relevant government departments as recently as last week.
“We managed to resolve a lot of the obstacles that they have, but they don’t have any firm time frames for treatment.
“I think the Department of Correctional Services is still hoping to settle the matter, but our main concern is: When will treatment start?” said Govender.
She added that the battle had started in October last year and that after discussions in December “the state authorities acknowledged that they needed to provide treatment.
“The two major obstacles at that time were that public health facilities in the area were refusing to provide treatment and the Department of Health required people to have identity books before treatment could start.”
Govender said that by January this year the King Edward Hospital had been earmarked as a treatment provider, while officials from the Department of Home Affairs visited the prison to facilitate the issuing of ID books.
However, she said the process of applying for ID documents had only just begun for those prisoners who could pay the application fee, while the Department of Correctional Services “couldn’t pay for those who didn’t have the money”.
“In March we had new CD4 counts done for the applicants and there was a huge deterioration in their health.
“We realised that negotiation with the Department of Correctional Services wasn’t working and eventually we launched the court action,” said Govender.
She said other prison hospitals around the country were supplying anti-retrovirals to inmates.