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Aids stats: DA won't apologise
07/05/2008 16:19 - (SA)
Johannesburg - The Democratic Alliance has refused to apologise to the Department of Health after calling for an explanation of why the official HIV statistics are low compared to figures released by the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA).
DA spokesperson Sandy Kalyan said on Wednesday that she based her information on a Sunday Independent article that stated the HIV prevalence was at 7.6 million, according to a DBSA research.
Kalyan said the DBSA should apologise to South Africans, Department of Health and herself for putting unsubstantiated information in the public domain.
"I don't owe anyone an apology, I was basing my comments on the newspaper report. If anything, the DBSA should make all the apologies," she said.
She said the HIV pandemic was worrying and people were bound to react when such figures were published.
On Monday the DA took the minister of health to task on the basis of DBSA figures, accusing her of keeping the statistics low.
"The minister needs to be interrogated about how her department collects the data that it bases its treatment programme on," Kalyan said on Monday.
The DBSA issued a statement on Tuesday saying its research had not been validated and approved. The DBSA apologised for the misunderstanding.
The Department of Health has called for a retraction and apology from Kalyan.
"We call upon the honourable Kalyan to do the right thing and apologise for taking DBSA figures at face value and for throwing unjustified allegations at the health minister,'' a spokesman said.
Health Department spokesperson Sibani Mngadi said his department used the model approved by UNAIDS to estimate the level of HIV prevalence in the country.
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