Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Associated Press - Wednesday November 21, 2001
Christopher Bodeen, Associated Press Writer
China accounts for half the region's 600 million children, according to U.N. figures. Elsewhere in the region, which includes India, about 200,000 children have been infected with HIV, with 70,000 new cases in 2000 alone, said Mehr Khan, U.N. Children's Fund regional director for East Asia and the Pacific.
Although the government endorses scholarly estimates of a total of 600,000 HIV infections in China, other researchers put the figure at 1.5 million, said Edwin J. Judd, UNICEF area representative for China and Mongolia. Current infection rates could produce about 10 million new cases by 2010, he said.
The government says the number of newly reported infections jumped 67 percent in the first six months of 2001 compared to the first half of last year. China says it hopes to slow the increase in new infections by 10 percent annually by 2005.
"China has the opportunity to prevent a major, major epidemic" but must act now to slow the rate of new infections, Judd said.
The comments came at the end of Khan's nine-day visit, during which she attended a session of China's first-ever national conference on AIDS and toured UNICEF projects in the southwestern province of Sichuan.
HIV has been spread in China mostly by intravenous drug use and the thriving sex industry. Blood buyers spread the disease into the countryside by using unhygienic methods and infected hospital blood supplies.
In working with Chinese health authorities, UNICEF will focus on preventing infected mothers from passing the virus to children, Judd said.
Khan said she also looked into UNICEF cooperation with the Chinese government on preventing trafficking in women and children, a problem she said often crosses the country's borders with its neighbors.
About 88,000 women and children have been abducted and sold over the past decade to employers seeking cheap labor or farmers looking for wives and sons to carry on the family name, Judd said.
Judd said China has marked up successes in dealing with key children's health issues. China has virtually eradicated polio, with only one new case announced over the past several years. China has also made inroads against developmental disorders by ensuring iodine is added to more than 90 percent of all edible salt, although in some provinces the level is still as low as 50 percent, he said.
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