Press Interpreter

02/23/06 -- Don't be startled, but the number of people who have died from AIDS has already exceeded the number who have died from Hepatitis B. The Ministry of Health has released last year's legally mandated report on infectious disease epidemics in China. Of the 13,262 people who died from infectious diseases, the five diseases accounting for the greatest death tolls in order from greatest to least were: Tuberculosis, Rabies, AIDS, Hepatitis B, and Neonatal Tetanus. This report, which was released on February 14, Valentine's Day, didn't have the slightest shade of romance to it.

The number of Hepatitis B carriers and sufferers is largest, and the number who died from the disease is not small, but the number who died from AIDS is greater. In the area of noninfectious diseases, cancer was once the number one killer, and many people are terrified of developing it, but as medicine has improved, the world cure rate for all kinds of cancer has reached about 40%. "Cancer ≠equal death" has already become the consensus. Against this background, what has been called the "world epidemic" of AIDS has in fact become the current number one concern of the medical world.

At the moment that AIDS became the "third largest killer" the State Council on February 12 promulgated "AIDS Prevention and Treatment Regulations," which go into effect on March 1. The regulations include many practical provisions, such as making AIDS prevention education part of upper middle school education; prohibiting discrimination by work units or individuals against AIDS sufferers, those infected with AIDS, or members of their families; prohibiting the use of untested blood; providing for fines for government branches that do not promote awareness of AIDS; and requiring businesses using government organized public markets to provide condoms or to set up facilities for selling condoms subject to fines for failure to comply, etc. The appearance of these regulations was urgently needed, but one cannot say that "they have arrived at the right time." They should have been adopted a long time ago.

The state of AIDS prevention and treatment is generally that it "was cold in the past but is warm now," "is cold underneath but warm on the surface." An important reason why the "cold" approach to treatment and prevention persisted for too long a time was the belief that the disease was "untreatable." Early on in the AIDS infection "curve," while our country's infection level was just beginning its "upward crawl," a famous scientist of Chinese descent named He Dayi, who was the creator of AIDS "cocktail therapy," issued a serious warning about the disease. The other day on Pheonix TV,* He Dayi recalled, not without regret, that none of the relevant government departments would listen to him when he tried to tell them at the time that they should place a high degree of importance on the prevention and treatment of AIDS. Time Magazine once described He Dayi as "the hero who moved heaven and earth in humanity's struggle against AIDS." But it was unavoidable at that time that this hero would be met with nonchalance by our government's relevant departments and that "stern faces would overcome the hero." Today, He Dayi still believes that if effective measures are not adopted immediately, the number of Chinese infected with AIDS could reach 10 million. It is reminiscent of the time when He Dayi was considered alarmist that today there are still those who can believe that he is again "scaremongering."

What is so regrettable is that those officials who were "neither hot nor cold" about the treatment and prevention of AIDS didn't understand what everyone else does: "Murphy's Law." When you are buttering your bread in the morning and the slice falls on the floor, on what side will it land? On the buttered side of course. "If something bad could possibly happen, then no matter how slight the chance, it will always happen, and the worst possible outcome will be the most likely. " -- This is the famous Murphy's Law, which many people the world over, including scientists, privately believe in. However, some people still have not learned it. Today's trend in the development of AIDS in China most certainly has not escaped the grasp of "Murphy's Law."

Over the past few years, the greatest efforts towards "AIDS prevention" have been at the grassroots, individual level. Septuagenarian professor Gao Yaojie is reputed to be "China's number one grassroots AIDS fighter." She was once named the woman of the year who "most touched China" by Central TV. United Nations Secretary General Annan praised her as "the number one woman activist promoting AIDS prevention in Chinese rural areas." She is the kind of person who "doesn't mind her own business" by volunteering to work for AIDS prevention. She spent spent eight years interviewing more than 1000 people infected with or suffering from AIDS and wrote the book "China AIDS Investigation," which exposed the seriousness of the prevalence of AIDS in contemporary China.

The fact that the number of people who have died from AIDS in our country has surpassed the number who have died from Hepatitis B shows how severe the reality of the situation is. Even if today we now have "AIDS Prevention and Treatment Regulations," we nevertheless should not be too optimistic about the future. This reporter once asked He Dayi: do you believe that AIDS will be eradicated in the next ten years? He Dayi answered: "unfortunately, I think that it most certainly will not be. It pains me to say so. But we still have no vaccine. And AIDS is continuing to spread. So I believe that eradicating AIDS will require several generations of effort." Thus success in the prevention and treatment of AIDS is a long way off. The conscientious and responsible must give their all and persevere.

[Full Article]

By Xu Xunlei

*Pheonix TV is a Hong Kong based satellite television station that serves greater China. See http://www.phoenixtv.com/phoenixtv/77405618595430400/index.shtml .

--Translated by Ramsi Woodcock

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