Healers march against TAC
2004-11-23 23:34
Special Report
The South African government has announced a joint venture to reduce the cost of anti-retroviral drugs with a Swiss company.
Johannesburg - More than 500 traditional healers marched to the Treatment Action Campaign's offices in Cape Town and Johannesburg on Tuesday, demanding that the organisation promoted traditional medicine in the same way as Western medicine.
The protesters, who also are TAC members, have threatened to quit the organisation for advocating so-called Western medicine at the expense of traditional medicine.
The TAC's Siphokazi Mthathi said the organisation "promotes anything that is evidence-based".
Mthathi said: "They can't ask us to blindly promote anything where there is no evidence."
Asked if the TAC had ever promoted any traditional medicine, she said: "I would not say we have..."
Mthathi urged traditional healers to organise themselves, and said the TAC was committed to working with them.
Hundreds of people took place in march
She said HIV had opened up business opportunities for some people and some of them had no proper training.
Mthathi said: "We want things to be standardised."
According to the TAC, about 500 people were at Tuesday's protest in Johannesburg and 40 at the one in Cape Town.
Johannesburg police said about 1 000 people applied to take part in the march, but could not tell how many attended.
- SAPA