Associated Press - December 1, 2003

The government has been sluggish for years about disclosing the extent of AIDS here, or broaching the topic in the media.

But the harsh international response after the government's initial secrecy during the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome earlier this year has apparently prompted a more open approach to AIDS.

State-run newspapers on Monday were filled with articles on AIDS and World AIDS Day activities. The government's national midday newscast also highlighted the event.

Citing a new survey by the Ministry of Health, World Health Organization and UNAIDS, The China Daily newspaper said 840,000 people in China were HIV-positive and 80,000 had developed AIDS.

It was the first time China has investigated the extent of the disease using international standards and methods, the paper quoted Hao Yang, an official with the Health Ministry's Disease Control Department, as saying.

Chinese officials and the United Nations have warned that 10 million people could be infected by 2020 without better prevention.

Health workers in the capital, Beijing, on Monday fanned out to construction sites and schools to teach AIDS-prevention methods, and to try to dispel the stigma of the illness.

At a site near the Foreign Ministry, representatives from the Beijing Center for Disease Control handed brochures and condoms to workers - who clamored for their share. Some left with fistfuls of prophylactics after hearing a worker describe how they should be used.

Drug abuse has been blamed as the main HIV culprit in China - but thousands have also been infected by syndicates selling tainted blood, especially in central China.

Executive Vice Health Minister Gao Qiang warned last month that the country was falling short in its fight against AIDS - a striking admission of official shortcoming that suggests new openness.

"China is still faced with arduous tasks," he was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua News Agency.

Gao promised that 5,000 poor HIV and AIDS patients would receive free treatment starting this year. Health officials say this will rise to 40,000 by 2008.

As of September, Beijing had 1,562 reported HIV-positive people and 143 AIDS cases, health officials said last week.

"There has been a clear increase of AIDS patients in recent years," said Deng Xiaohong, deputy director of Beijing's Municipal Health Bureau.

The number of AIDS sufferers also increased in Shanghai, Xinhua said, citing Peng Jing, deputy director of the Shanghai Health Administration.

As of November, 886 people were infected with the disease, Peng said. The number of new cases - 170 people - was up more than 6% from last year.

The country's premier, illustrating his government's public efforts, visited AIDS patients at a Beijing hospital.

Premier Wen Jiabao visited Beijing's Ditan Hospital and spoke with AIDS patients Monday morning, a nurse who wouldn't give her name told The Associated Press. Wen had been expected to pay such a visit, though international media weren't permitted to attend.

While HIV in China is mostly confined to intravenous drug users and people infected by the buying of tainted blood, the country's tens of millions of migrant workers could prove "the next wave," said Siri Tellier, chairwoman of the U.N. Theme Group on HIV/AIDS in China.

"Migrant workers are an at-risk group. They're young, they're at an age when they're becoming sexually active, and they're far from their families," said Li Xiaohong of the Beijing Center for Disease Control.

"It's easy for them to look for a partner and change partners," she said. "They have sexual needs, but they don't have knowledge (about AIDS), so it's very easy for them to spread it."

"This is such an enormous group, and it is very difficult to know what is happening with them," Tellier said.

"I don't think anyone knows (how many HIV and AIDS sufferers there are) in China," she said. She said there has been no widespread blood testing in the country and called on Beijing to improve its monitoring.

Also, many sufferers hide that they are sick because of the social sigma attached to having a disease that many in China deem is caused by "immoral" behavior, the U.N. agency said in a report released Monday.

Health workers have tried to reach migrants by handing out condoms and putting up posters at railway stations, she said, but the Chinese government was initially reluctant to allow posters with condoms or descriptions of risky sex.

The city is also setting up a recreation center for people with AIDS equipped with computers, books, sofas and "everything that a living room should have," the Shanghai Evening Post said.

"AIDS sufferers need medicine, but they also need psychological help," Dr. Tian Xiuhong, of the Minhang district AIDS prevention office, was quoted as saying.

He said he hopes the "AIDS den" can create an environment where "sick people can have the feeling of coming home."
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