 The Namibian government denied that there was a policy to sterilise HIV positive women, and denied that the applicants’ consent to sterilisation had been coerced.The government accepted that coerced sterilisation would be a violation of the constitutional rights invoked by the women, but argued that the hospitals had obtained the women's consent correctly.On 30 July 2012, Judge Elton Hoff held that the evidence presented by the women demonstrated that they had not given informed consent to the sterilisations.