The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has accused the KwaZulu-Natal health department of returning to the “bad old days” of Thabo Mbeki’s presidency by using a controversial male circumcision device in its HIV/Aids intervention programme.
“During the [Manto] Tshabalala-Msimang era, the state frequently supported untested remedies — remember Virodene, Matthias Rath and Tine van der Maas?” said Nathan Geffen, the TAC treasurer.
“We thought those days were behind us.”
Tshabalala-Msimang was the controversial former health minister.
The TAC’s concerns involve the Tara KLamp, a disposable device that Malaysian manufacturers claim makes circumcisions quicker and safer.
The Mail & Guardian reported in June that the World Health Organisation (WHO) has not approved the device and that medical experts Âquestion its suitability for the circumcision of adults.
In 2004 a study conducted in Orange Farm found that 37% of participants on whom the Tara KLamp was used experienced complications compared with 3,4% treated in the standard forceps-guided way.
Complication rates for male circumcision are typically in the 2% to 10% range.
The KwaZulu-Natal health department began using the device in April this year as part of its plan to target 186703 uncircumcised men in 2010-2011.
Medical male circumcision has been identified as an effective way of limiting the spread of HIV.
Geffen said the Tara KLamp “puts men at unnecessary risk of injury and pain and will undermine the rollout of circumcision”.
The TAC is not against circumcision per se, Geffen said, “but we are concerned about this particular device”.
The TAC has been trying to meet the provinces’s health authorities since July 8 but says its requests have been ignored.
But Chris Maxon, the health department spokesperson, said: “So far we have found that what people are raising as concerns have not been experienced in the province.
“We have teams of specialised surgeons out there using the device and at no stage have they rung alarm bells.”
The department had circumcised about 1 000 men with the Tara KLamp since April and only four had been admitted to hospital with pain and swelling, Maxon said.
Aaron Motsoaledi, the Minister of Health, has convened a meeting of a task team consisting of national and provincial health representatives, the WHO, the Southern African HIV Clinicians’ Society and “some members of the TAC”, Maxon said.
They will meet on August 2 to “look at how male medical circumcision is being implemented with relation to national policy”.
The TAC had not received an invitation to the August 2 meeting, Geffen said on Thursday.