London — A critical test case in South Africa in less than two months could decide whether or not African countries will in future be able to import cheap generic drugs to treat their Aids afflicted populations.

On March 5, the might of the world's major pharmaceutical giants are set to take the South African government to court over a law passed by previous President Nelson Mandela giving his country the right to buy huge amounts of generic drugs and sell them cheaply in South Africa.

The law also allows South Africa to compulsorily licence HIV drugs and manufacture them within the Republic, undercutting the multinational drug companies

The issue is critical for Africa because generic drugs, which are usually made in East or South Asia are often a fraction of the cost of the drugs produced by the western pharmaceuticals.

The pharmaceuticals say that importing such drugs breaks agreed rules on intellectual property rights and they want the law overturned.

While it is acknowledged that only around one per cent of drug revenues to the multinationals come from the entire African continent, the pharmaceuticals believe the issue is a threat to their interests.

They claim that money lost through cheap generic drugs could be ploughed into more research and development which may ultimately lead to a cure for HIV.

The companies also argue that farming out cheap pills to countries that don't have robust infrastructures will not work. They say that such drugs have to be monitored with scans and therapies and if that is not done the drugs are useless.

But what campaigners believe the western drugs companies are most afraid of is that the case will alert the public as to the true low cost of many anti-retroviral drugs, leading cash-strapped western health authorities to themselves look to the cheap generic alternative.

The campaigners also point out that most pharmaceutical companies have already made substantial amounts of money from the anti-HIV drugs and that these should no longer have a patent.

"The big drugs firms are scared that if they turn a blind eye to the wholesale production of cheap, generic drugs in South Africa it will set a dangerous precedent which will be difficult to prevent spreading," an Observer story said

In Kenya, the case is likely to be watched with interest by the government which is at present being forced into accepting World Trade Organisation rules which allow for a 25 year patent on such drugs.

At present only a staggering 0.001 per cent of the 25 million people infected with HIV in Africa receive anti-retroviral drugs which are now known to significantly prolong the lives of people with HIV and are usually freely available in the West.

To head-off growing concern within Africa and a building anti- pharmaceutical campaign in the West, drugs companies have responded to accusations that they are acting inhumanely in putting profits before the health of a whole region by beginning talks to reduce the price of their drugs, providing that countries agree to health action plans which have been drawn up.

Already Uganda and Senegal have come to an agreement on the issue and others are set to follow suit.

GlaxoSmithKline, the UK company, has gone further in offering to supply HIV treatments at 80 per cent discounts of prices in the West, if developing countries were to have the correct health infrastructures in place.

But the Observer newspaper points out that previous high profile offers of cheap Aids treatment from the Clinton administration came with strings attached.

It noted that a $ 1 billion offer of cheap drugs from the US last year turned out to be export-import loans at commercial interest rates to buy US drugs at market prices. The offer was turned down.

Western governments are fighting shy of taking on the multi- nationals on the issue arguing that the right approach is for poor countries to negotiate discounts with the pharmaceuticals.

But campaigners point out that African countries can't even afford the discounted prices offered.

In November, the chairman of Kenya's Aids control council, Dr Mohammed Abdullah said that the proposals set out last summer by the world's leading pharmaceutical companies to slash the cost of Aids drugs was "cynical and hypocritical" because it would only bring prices down to Europeans levels meaning that the vast majority of Kenyans still could not pay for the anti-retroviral drugs.

Western campaigners are increasingly highlighting the problem as the new issue of the 21st century arguing that developing countries must be able to use all possible means to get hold of affordable drugs to stop their people dying.

"Imaging witnessing devastating plague and sitting on a cure for fear of incurring shareholder revolt," said Ben Jackson of the UK-based development group 'Action for Southern Africa.' "That essentially is the position of drugs companies. Sure healthcare infrastructures have to be put in place but it is not an either-or argument. These things can be done simultaneously."

The Observer newspaper however notes that if the South African government loses the case it could face costs running into tens of millions of dollars.