S Africa "rejected AIDS drug offers"

The South African Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association has claimedthat the country has rejected or ignored offers from drugmakers to supply HIV/AIDS treatments at discounted prices or free of charge.

An affidavit filed by the SAPMA in the Pretoria High Court, which is to resume its hearing of the court case brought by the industry against the government on April 18 (Marketletters passim), states: "to the extent that prices of medicines do enter the considerations, it is clear they cannot play a significant role because the government declines to use these products, even where they are offered for free."

SAPMA chief executive Mirryena Deeb said the government had not taken up the offers, which were made initially in May 2000 by Boehringer Ingelheim, Roche, Bristol-Myers Squibb and GlaxoSmithKline, and had "not yet even initiated discussions" aimed at procuring "the medicines in question at the very substantial savings that the offers entail," she said, notes a report in the country's Sunday Independent newspaper.