South Africa: Military gets new HIV policy

The announcement in late 2009 that the government had approved a new HIV/AIDS policy in the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) was widely welcomed by AIDS and human rights lobbyists as long overdue. A November 2009 statement by the SANDF noted that the new policy made provision for the "recruitment and selective deployment of HIV-positive members" of the military and complied with a High Court ruling in May 2008, which found the previous policy of excluding HIV-positive people from recruitment and foreign deployment unconstitutional.