China has 840,000 HIV-infected people: Report
AP[ THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 06, 2003 12:41:36 AM ]
BEIJING: China currently has 840,000 HIV carriers and 80,000 AIDS patients, a senior Chinese official said on Thursday, Xinhua reports.
Gao Qiang, China's executive deputy minister of health, made the remark at an international economic forum here, adding the statistics were from a joint epidemiological survey conducted by China, the World Health Organisation and UNAIDS.
He said that many AIDS organisations at home and abroad were using "accumulative data", not differentiating clearly HIV carriers, AIDS patients and deducting dead AIDS sufferers from the total number.
That was why the official figure was lower than many estimates, Gao explained.
He added that China planned to offer free treatment to HIV carriers and AIDS patients in the country's rural areas and urban AIDS-infected population who were in financial difficulties.
About 5,000 HIV carriers and AIDS patients in poverty would receive free treatment this year and the free treatment would be available for all poor HIV carriers and AIDS patients next year, he announced.
Gao said that HIV/AIDS was a common enemy of humankind and the Chinese government attached great importance to prevention and treatment and treated it as a strategic issue for social stability, economic development, national prosperity and security.
HIV/AIDS in China had not been controlled and prevention and treatment in China was still faced with arduous tasks, Gao said.
Chinese central and local governments have allocated 6.8 billion yuan ($850 million) to establish and improve the disease prevention and control mechanism in the provinces.
Each year, over 200 million yuan ($24 million) is spent on a special fund for HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment.
Central and local governments would invest 2.25 billion yuan ($272 million) mainly to strengthen blood-testing stations in the middle and western regions, Gao said.
He added that China would protect the legitimate rights of HIV/AIDS patients and oppose social discrimination.
timesofindia.indiatimes.com |
