Shanghai to Provide Free AIDS Treatment for Needy

Citing concern about HIV's spread among young adults in China's business capital, Shanghai will provide free or reduced-cost AIDS treatment to needy patients, the Wen Hui Daily and other state media reported. Shanghai officials were quoted as saying that 195 new HIV infections were confirmed in the city of 20 million last year -- with people ages 20-40 most affected. The city, China's largest, reported 911 people with HIV and 51 deaths from AIDS last year.

While the details of Shanghai's new policies are yet to be released, the reports said they would include free HIV testing and treatment for pregnant women and free HIV tests for residents requesting them. The government is also considering increasing STD prevention through condom promotion and supplying clean syringes for drug addicts, the reports said.

Standard drugs for treating HIV patients cost 30,000-50,000 yuan (US$3,630-6,050) a year -- well beyond the means of most Chinese. Even in prosperous Shanghai, the average person only makes about 14,868 yuan (US$1,800) a year.

Though once mainly limited to victims of unsanitary blood-buying programs or other high-risk groups such as sex workers or drug users, HIV/AIDS is now spreading from these groups to the general population, officials warn. China's government said the country has 840,000 HIV-infected patients and 80,000 people with AIDS, but UNAIDS said 10 million people could be infected by 2010 without more aggressive prevention policies. AIDS activists have been critical of the government's failure to recognize the extent of the disease in China.

In April, the government ordered local authorities to provide free HIV testing and treatment for the poor but did not elaborate on how this would be financed in less-developed regions.

Back to other news for May 19, 2004