Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2002. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
South African Press Association (Johannesburg) - October 10, 2002
The minister told reporters in Muldersdrift, outside Johannesburg the guide, titled "Managing HIV/Aids In The Workplace", would help public servants to become more proactive when dealing with the disease.
She said the 154 page manual would help put an end to the discrimination of public servants living with HIV/Aids as it contained the minimum standards all departments were expected to comply with when dealing with the pandemic.
The minister also announced that voluntary counselling and testing pilot sites for HIV/Aids had been set up for public servants in Mpumalanga, KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape.
"The aim is to maximise the creation of a conducive working environment for public servants to deliver services effectively.
"The lessons drawn from these sites will be replicated in the public service as a whole."
Fraser-Moleketi was attending the Public Service Aids Indaba currently being held in Muldersdrift. The indaba is looking at developing policies and programmes to deal with HIV/Aids in the civil service.
National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union president Vusi Nhlapo told reporters that he welcomed the new document.
He said one area that urgently needed to be addressed in the public service was pension funds and medical aids for those infected with HIV/Aids.
Nhlapo said certain public servants also needed to be trained in HIV/Aids counselling.
He also said the government needed to take the lead in lifting the stigma of HIV/Aids as many people who were infected were afraid to say why they were not at work.
Deputy President Jacob Zuma, who addressed the indaba earlier in the day, said HIV/Aids was South Africa's greatest foe.
"HIV/Aids is enemy number one. (It's) a kind of enemy that will not move from its base and look for you. In the majority of cases you walk towards it and get in its base. It then attacks and this is fatal," he said.
"HIV/Aids poses a serious challenge... and it requires a collective response from all of us," he said.
Zuma, who heads the SA National Aids Council, said there was a lot of innovation within the public service on dealing with HIV/Aids.
He said "food banks" had been proposed for each government department whereby civil servants could donate non-perishable food to ease the plight of HIV/Aids orphans.
Another idea was "leave banks" which would allow healthy public servants through human resources departments to donate their leave days to colleagues suffering from the disease.
"This will cover loss of time, productivity and income," Zuma said.
On a cure for HIV/Aids, Zuma told delegates that South Africa's Aids vaccine programme was moving at a "quick" pace.
He said some vaccines were at an advanced stage of testing and those chosen would be manufactured towards the end of this year and next year. Clinical trials would start later in 2003.
However he warned that prevention of the disease was still better than treatment because there was as yet no cure.
"There is no cure; to prevent it from getting to us is the most important," Zuma said.
The two-day indaba, which is being attended by representatives from all levels of government, ends on Friday.
The public service is South Africa's single biggest employer with nearly 1,1 million civil servants employed by about 140 government departments.
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