Kaduna — The Kaduna Division of the Court of Appeal has fixed November 20 as the hearing date for the trial of the 1996 trovan clinical case involving the death of some children in Kano.

The appeal which was instituted by A. Dogunro and Lere Baale and earlier slated for trial by the Appeal Court for Thursday could not however go on following the one week Judges Conference taking place in Abuja.

When the matter first came up at the Appeal Court last month, the presiding trial Justice, Mrs. Amina Augie leading two other Justices of the Court had directed Pfizer to ensure that all the relevant parties in the case were served the Court processes and joined accordingly.

Pfizer had appealed the earlier ruling of a Kano High Court, which issued a bench warrant against the multinational pharmaceutical company. Besides the appeal, there is another criminal matter instituted against Pfizer in a Kano High Court by the State Government and another civil matter instituted by the Federal Government against the pharmaceutical firm. Pfizer is being accused of causing the death of yet to be determined number of children in Kano in 1996 following the clinical test of trovan vaccines administered on the children to combat outburst of severe cerebral spinal meningitis on the affected children.It has been the contention of the Kano State Government that the drug test was not authorized by it before they were administered on the children but Pfizer on its part has consistently maintained that the trovan drug test was not only authorized by the State Government but it in addition helped in saving the lives of many of the children already written off by the severe cerebral meningitis.

Meanwhile, there is on-going negotiation by the affected parties to settle the matter amicably out of Court. The said out of Court settlement necessitated the continual trial of the matter at the Kano High Court last week following appeal by counsel to the matter to allow the parties more time to conclude the on going talks.