JOHANNESBURG, Dec 1 (AFP) - South Africa's government, labour, business and AIDS activists reached a deal Saturday that could soon broaden the access to anti-retroviral therapy, a news report said Sunday.
The deal, reached through South Africa's arbitration body, the National Economic, Development and Labour Council (NEDLAC), was all-encompassing and dealt with a range of issues including prevention programmes, access to medication and goals for reducing HIV/AIDS in South Africa.
It included an understanding that "no person should be sent away from hospital or a health care institution, or not treated because of their HIV status," the Sunday Independent reported.
It set a target of reducing by one-fifth the number of babies infected with HIV by 2005, recognising the importance of providing anti-retroviral drugs as part of a national prevention and treatment programme.
But no specific deadlines was set for the provision of anti-retroviral drugs to people living with the disease, the paper added.
There was an agreement, however, that the parties which brokered the NEDLAC deal would return to negotiations after February next year, once a government report about the affordability of the anti-retrovirals had been completed.
The agreement also set the target of reducing next year new HIV infections by 25 percent among 15 to 24 year-olds, and launching a series of national days to promote HIV testing.
"This agreement was reached just a day ago. Once being implemented, it will begin to change the impact in the fight against AIDS," Mark Heywood, spokesman for the AIDS lobby group, the Treatment Action Campaign, was quoted as saying.
"There are changes in attitude in government. We are feeling much more positive about the commitment in government. We have always said we want to work with government, fighting this epidemic needs people to stand together."
South Africa has one of the highest HIV infection rates in the world, with five million of its 46 million citizens carrying the virus, and 360,000 deaths in 2001.
UN figures show that more than 20 percent of South African adults are infected, while 660,000 South African children have been orphaned as a result of AIDS.
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