Associated Press
Sex has overtaken drug use as the main cause of HIV infections in China, leading to worries the disease may spread outside of high-risk groups into the general population, according to experts and a report released this week, ahead of World AIDS Day this Saturday.
There were an estimated 50,000 new cases of HIV in 2007, taking the total to an estimated 700,000 people living with the virus in China, said the report issued jointly by UNAIDS and a committee of the State Council, China's Cabinet.
Despite a fall in the rate of new cases since the data were last collected in 2005, infections were still spreading, and sex—not intravenous drug use—was now the main form of transmission, Health Minister Chen Zhu said at a news conference.
"China's HIV epidemic remains one of low prevalence overall but with pockets of high infection," he said.
The current rate of infection is less than one percent of China's overall population, he said, but as many as 50 million more are at risk now that the main form of transmission is sex.
Beijing must ensure transmission from high-risk populations "can be stopped and held down, because there is substantial potential for spreading," said Bernhard Schwartlander, country coordinator for UNAIDS in China.
Prostitutes and gay men were singled out in the report for risky behavior that was contributing to most of the new cases, Chen said.
Some 60 percent of prostitutes do not regularly use condoms, according to the report.
Prostitution is widespread in China, even though it is officially illegal. Estimates vary widely on the number of sex workers, but the figure is widely believed to be in the millions.
AIDS in China
HIV gained a foothold in China largely due to unsanitary blood plasma-buying schemes and tainted transfusions in hospitals, especially in the 1990s. Chen told reporters Thursday that these practices had been "effectively contained," but he did not elaborate.
After years of denying that AIDS was a problem, Chinese leaders have shifted gears dramatically in recent years, confronting the disease more openly and promising anonymous testing, free treatment for the poor, and a ban on discrimination against people with the virus.
