UN's Annan: China Has "No Time to Lose" in Curbing Spread of AIDS

China has "no time to lose" in preventing a massive outbreak of AIDS and must take decisive action to prevent the epidemic from hurting its economy, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said today. His remarks in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou kicked off two days of consultations with Chinese leaders. Those meetings were expected to focus on Iraq and other urgent issues before the UN, where China's permanent Security Council seat gives it veto power. But Annan focused his first appearance in China firmly on AIDS.

"The truth is that, today, China stands on brink of an explosive AIDS epidemic," Annan told 500 students at Zhejiang University. "There is no time to lose if China is to prevent a massive further spread of HIV/AIDS. China is facing a decisive moment." Failure to tackle the problem, he warned, would saddle China with such burdens as an exponential growth in the number of AIDS orphans and development-sapping loss of efficiency.

China says about 1 million Chinese are HIV-infected, but it says the rate of new infections seems to be falling. Government efforts to supply low-cost treatments and clean up an unsanitary blood-buying industry blamed for infecting thousands of rural villagers are helping reduce new infection, according to the Health Ministry. The nation has begun manufacturing generic versions of AIDS drugs such as AZT at one-tenth the cost of imported versions. On Monday, the Beijing Youth Daily reported that HIV patients will be able to obtain the AIDS drug cocktail in an inexpensive domestic version by year's end.

However, after years of denying that AIDS was a problem, China's communist government only recently began to acknowledge the issue. Public AIDS awareness is still low, and leaders do not discuss the disease. AIDS activists have been jailed, and officials have harassed journalists and others attempting to publicize the issue.

Following his visit to China, Annan will travel to Mongolia and five central Asian republics.

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