China's health minister warns of HIV spread

SHANGHAI: AIDS is spreading rapidly among high-risk groups in parts of China and is threatening to become a serious epidemic, said Minister of Health Chen Zhu on Tuesday.

A total of 319,877 people had been registered HIV positive, including 102,323 AIDS patients and 49,845 deaths, as of October 31, according to statistics released on a national AIDS control meeting in Shanghai.
But the actual numbers could be much greater as the statistics only included cases reported by medical facilities.

Another 41,000 to 55,000 people would have contracted the virus within 2009, according to the estimation.
Taking combating HIV/AIDS as a high priority, the government had categorized it "as a strategic issue bearing on economic work and social stability," Chen said.

 The HIV/AIDS crisis in China continues to be one of the most unreported epidemics the world is currently seeing in regards to the spread of the disease. While the tone toward HIV/AIDS in the west is one of more optimism, mostly due to a combination of successful preventative efforts and life extending drug concoctions, China continues to struggle with even the simple task of getting its numbers straight.

The problem with statistics in China for any sensitive subject is the issue of local versus central government agendas. A local government wants to look competent in every way it possibly can to curry favor with those slightly higher than them in the system. Throughout the chain of command from local to central government, information on all sorts of negative information, varying from HIV/AIDS statistics to underage internet cafe attendance, is skewed or omitted as each tries to curry favor with their superior.

What the central government, and subsequently the world, is always left with are inherently underreported numbers. Some accuse the central government of deliberatly manipulating the statistics, to which my prior argument in regards to the effects of bureaucractic showmanship on accurate reporting should disprove. The sad truth of the matter is that the central government is itself unable to get the statistics it wants, and by and large would like to have an accurate picture for itself and to reclaim some of its credibility to international watchdog groups.

All of this aside, the HIV/AIDS issues in China should not be ignored. The government's campaigns against it are well intentioned, though it still remains to be seen whether or not it is having an effect on the migrant worker high risk groups, who are frequently paying for sex, because they have no permanent residence and are thus difficult to gain information on their health in general. No city is going to want to take the plunge of trying to acquire all this information from a population that may not well return the next year, depending on job availability, and would render any long term statistics useless.

The last problem involves the poor female population and the rich male population. Because of relative acceptance of prostitution as a legitimate business in most Chinese cities, at least off the record, there is a particular risk that prostitution has made the disease anything but a poor/rural disease. These numbers are more likely to be reported on, cities having more leeway for bad news if it concerns wealthier individuals,and hopefully dealt with. However, one would be foolish to argue that the solution would be an end to prostitution. Try to explain to the local Chinese government how you are going to replace all of those jobs. Try it. It is harder than it looks.

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