Religious Leaders, AIDS Activists Urge South African Government to Declare AIDS National Emergency

South African religious leaders and AIDS activists appealed to the government Thursday to declare the HIV pandemic a national emergency. An unreleased report by South Africa's Medical Research Council estimated that AIDS caused 40 percent of South African deaths last year. AIDS activists have accused the government of suppressing that report, but officials said it needed further study. "These data are clear, and must not be obscured by wishful thinking," said the statement released by the Anglican Church, the South African Catholic Bishops Conference, the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the AIDS activist group Treatment Action Campaign.

"Our clergy report that every week they are burying people who die of AIDS. Young workers are disappearing and dying from 'natural causes' in the prime of life, leaving their families behind with no income or support. Educators and [students] are buried alongside each other," said the statement, which expressed concern that the government was trying to downplay the new report.

The group called on the government to declare AIDS a national emergency, to provide moral and political leadership to fight the disease, and to increase the health budget to provide cheaper AIDS drugs, better care for the infected and better education. The groups are working to create an alliance to coordinate a plan to prevent new infections and to help develop a national treatment plan for those already infected. "We are making HIV/AIDS a top priority. We call on our government to do the same," the statement said.

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