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Speech by the Minister of Health of Health at the Opening of the South African HIV/AIDS Stand at the Bangkok Conference

• Prevention
• Treatment, Care and Support
• Research and surveillance
• As well as Legal and Human rights


We discussed our experiences on the successes and difficulties we have faced in implementing this strategic plan at the previous two international AIDS conferences in Durban and Barcelona. This is the first international AIDS conference to be held since our Cabinet adopted what we call the Comprehensive Plan for Management, Care and Treatment of HIV/AIDS in November last year. While we have made significant progress in its implementation, we hope that the deliberations here will assist us in enhancing the implementation of this Comprehensive Plan. In the absence of a cure, the Plan emphasizes the centrality of prevention in our national response to HIV/AIDS. It requires us to sustain and scale up prevention efforts.

We are intensifying our programme to encourage especially young people to abstain from sex and those who are sexually active to be faithful to one partner. We are proactively marketing the free high quality male condoms provided by government and their distribution has increased by 80% over the past six years (from 150 million in 1997 to 270 million in 2003). We have also increased the budget for HIV/AIDS communication campaign called Khomanani Caring Together from R90 million to R165 million over a two-year period. Our communication activities are focused at providing detailed information on how HIV is transmitted and can be prevented; knowing your HIV status; and the holistic management of HIV/AIDS including details about when and how anti-retroviral treatment can be taken. Our Comprehensive Plan also emphasizes the strengthening of the national health system for it to sustain a series of interventions aimed at mitigating the impact of AIDS.

More health professionals are being recruited to support implementation at both national and provincial level. Like other developing countries, we are facing challenges in acquiring adequate staffing levels mainly due to inadequate numbers of certain categories of health professionals in the country, limited number of people experienced in HIV/AIDS care and treatment as well as difficulties in recruiting and retaining health professionals in rural and underserved areas.

We are engaging our academic institutions on increasing the output of scarce categories of health professionals. We are spending R750 million this year on rural and scarce skills allowances to attract and retain health professionals in the public health sector and in rural areas. Clearly, the issue of recruitment of health professionals from developing countries has to be addressed urgently if we are to retain our skills base. We are also introducing a category of mid-level health workers (including medical and pharmacist assistants) to support the delivery of services. We have also launched a community health worker programme and streamlined the training of these workers to enable them to provide a comprehensive support to families affected by HIV/AIDS and other social problems by directing them to various government social support services.

We initiated a process of evaluating our health facilities to ensure that they have the necessary capacity to provide quality services envisaged in the comprehensive plan. Facilities with sufficient capacity are accredited and can begin to provide services including anti-retroviral therapy. We give special attention to those who do not meet the requirements and improve their capacity. We have a target of establishing a service point in each of our 53 districts with this financial year ending in March 2005 and a service point in every local municipality within five years. Many facilities have been accredited and we believe that this approach will enable all South Africans to have access to a comprehensive package of quality services irrespective of their geographical location within our vast country with a history of inequitable distribution of resources. These services include a series of interventions aimed at prolonging the progression from HIV infection to development of AIDS-defining conditions and ensuring optimal health for people living with HIV/AIDS.

We have extended laboratory networks to service the accredited facilities. These laboratories are conducting CD4 count tests, which are necessary to determine the progression of the disease and what intervention can be made available. They also do viral load and other tests to establish the effects of our interventions. HIV/AIDS severely affects the poor and puts extra demands for micronutrients on the body. We are therefore providing nutritional support for people living with HIV/AIDS and other debilitating conditions. This is part of many support services that government has made available to bring relief to people living in abject poverty.

We have invested resources on research into traditional medicines with preliminary findings indicating that indeed these medicines are providing relief for people living with HIV/AIDS. They are widely available, affordable and have simple regimens.

The full speech can be accessed via the hyperlink on the righthand side of this page