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Sout h Africa's government acknowledged for the first time that HIV causes Aids, a link once questioned by the country's president, and pledged to boost access to treatment for AIDS sufferers.

“The program of government is based on the belief that HIV does cause Aids,'' Themba Maseko, the head of the government communications service, told reporters in Cape Town today. “The government is serious about the fight against HIV and Aids. Our commitment to fighting the pandemic remains firm and unshaken.''

An estimated 5,5-million South Africans, or one in nine, are infected with HIV, according to government figures. Aids activists, United Nations officials and doctors have accused the government of sending out mixed messages on Aids and not doing enough to provide treatment.

President Thabo Mbeki has questioned the link between HIV and Aids, saying a virus cannot cause a syndrome, and refused to take a public HIV test. Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang has urged Aids sufferers to eat more beetroot and garlic to strengthen their immune systems and has backed the use of traditional medicines to help combat the disease.

“Nutrition is not an alternative,'' Maseko said. “The political bickering can only serve to de-motivate everyone. All the negative energy needs to be redirected towards supporting and strengthening'' the fight against the disease.

The UN estimates South Africa has the second-highest number of people infected with HIV in the world after India.

The government plans to set up a new Cabinet committee to coordinate and improve treatment and prevention programs, Maseko said. It also intends to strengthen the South African National Aids Council, which oversees the Aids programs and is chaired by Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka.

The government's statement are “an enormous victory for reason,'' said Zackie Achmat, chairman of the Treatment Action Campaign, the country's main Aids activist group. “But nice words are not enough. We want to meet with government'' and discuss what practical steps will be taken to broaden access to treatment.

South Africa was widely criticized at the 16th international Aids meeting in Toronto last month for failing to adequately address the spread of Aids. Stephen Lewis, the UN's special envoy to Africa on AIDS, said South Africa's government was “obtuse, dilatory and negligent about providing treatment'' at the conference's closing ceremony Aug. 18.

On Sept. 4, 82 scientists, including Robert C. Gallo, who helped discover the Aids virus, and David Baltimore, a Nobel Prize-winning biologist, wrote to Mbeki asking him to fire Tshabalala-Msimang, saying she is undermining the country's fight against Aids.

Tshabalala-Msimang has “expressed pseudo-scientific views about the management of HIV infection,'' they wrote. “To have as health minister a person who now has no international respect is an embarrassment to the South African government.''

Maseko said the Cabinet has not discussed Tshabalala- Msimang's job status.

‘The problem of address the challenge of dealing with HIV and Aids in this country is bigger than any individual,'' he said. “It's actually false to create the impression that if the minister would be axed, the problem goes away.''

Thami Mseleku, the director-general of the health department, on Sept. 3 defended the government's programs, saying about 178 000 AIDS sufferers were receiving treatment at state hospitals, compared with 134 000 in May. The Actuarial Society of South Africa estimates more than a half million people are so sick they need treatment.

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