UNAIDS chief sees signs of progress in China

By Ben Blanchard

BEIJING (Reuters) - There are signs for optimism in China's fight against HIV/AIDS such as growing use of anti-retrovirals, but harassment of civil society activists remains a worry, a top U.N. official said on Tuesday.

Peter Piot, head of the United Nations AIDS agency UNAIDS, said Chinese government and society were increasingly willing to talk about the problem in a country were eight people become infected an hour.

"I've been coming to China for 14 to 15 years, and I can say that the first five, six years there was basically no receptivity," he told a news conference. "Now today a lot is going on. Systems are being put in place. I think it's really different.

"When you look at it, there's strong leadership. The education is there, there is money, drugs. I think key obstacles are the size of the country and that everyone needs to know (about the problem)," he added.

"There are signs that the corner is being turned around for AIDS in China, but there are some big challenges ahead."

China recorded its first outbreak of AIDS in 1989. During the 1990s, many people -- notably in the central province of Henan -- contracted the virus through contaminated blood transfusions.

An estimated 650,000 people are living with HIV/AIDS in China, and health experts say the disease is moving into the general population with most new infections now spread sexually, although drug-users follow closely behind.

Wang Longde, a deputy health minister and China's AIDS chief, said greater use of anti-retrovirals in Henan had cut the death rate in half since 2002.