Counting the cost

摘要

Durban, South Africa, seems an obvious choice of venue for this year's world AIDS conference. Sub-Saharan Africa is in the epicentre of the pandemic and South Africa is the region's most powerful nation. Ten per cent of the world's AIDS population live within its borders. So why are politicians, conference organisers and even the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS having to avert a boycott? Because national and international criticism of South Africa's AIDS policies is reaching boiling point. The authorities stand accused of dismissing Western drugs as too toxic, promoting home-grown products that are far more dangerous but don't work, and refusing to fund treatment that reduces rates of mother-to-child transmission. And now, to the horror of the AIDS research establishment, the South African government appears to be exhuming the theory hatched by "dissident" US scientists that says HIV isn't the cause of AIDS.