BBC News - Wednesday, November 28, 2001
Increasing evidence has emerged of serious epidemics in several regions of China, according to the report by UNAids and the World Health Organisation.
In the Asia-Pacific region as a whole, more than one million people were newly infected with HIV this year, taking the total number to 7.1 million.
The new estimate for China is up from 600,000 in 2000.
Earlier this month China held its first national Aids conference, in what observers said was a sign the country was starting to take the problem seriously.
Blood scandal
In central Henan province, tens of thousands of rural villagers have become infected in the last 10 years after selling their blood to donation centres that did not follow proper safety procedures.
The Chinese Government only admitted the full scale of the crisis in August, and has pledged to spend more than $100m to improve the screening of blood used in transfusions.
But Wednesday's report says seven other provinces are now experiencing serious Aids/HIV epidemics, with nine more on the verge of crisis.
Needle-sharing among drug users is of particular concern, says the report - particularly in Xinjiang and Yunnan provinces.
Heterosexually transmitted epidemics are also on the increase, with HIV rates reaching 10.7% among sex workers in Guangxi province during 2000 (up from 6% in 1999).
Needle-sharing
Indonesia has also seen an explosion in the rate of Aids/HIV infection, according to UNAids.
After more than a decade in which Indonesia was barely affected by Aids/HIV, the world's fourth most populous nation has seen a rapid rise in infection rates.
The report says the highest risks of infection are among drug users and sex workers, but it warns that the wider population will also be hit hard unless prevention and education programmes are given top priority.
The report praised the efforts of Thailand and Cambodia to act quickly in bringing in Aids prevention programmes.
In Thailand, the annual rate of HIV infection is down to about 30,000 from a high of 140,000 in the early 1990s, the report said.
Aids is the biggest cause of death in Thailand, with one in 60 people infected with HIV - an estimated 700,000 people.
But that figure would be in the millions if it was not for Thailand's "well-founded, politically-supported and comprehensive prevention programmes", said the report.
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