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China: Vice-Premier must tackle AIDS reform
April 23, 2004
Chinese Vice-Premier and Minister of Health Wu Yi should do more to address
abuses against persons living with HIV/AIDS, Human Rights Watch said today. The
Vice-Premier is visiting Washington D.C. this week for meetings on trade and
commerce.
China faces what could become the largest HIV/AIDS epidemic in the world. Since
Wu took the helm of the Ministry of Health in 2003, the Ministry has announced
a new AIDS treatment plan, issued several new policy statements, and
established a national AIDS prevention committee. However, many abuses have yet
to be addressed.
"The Vice-premier has made some good statements about a new approach to China's
HIV/AIDS epidemic," said Sara Davis, researcher in the Asia Division of Human
Rights Watch. "But China should be judged on whether it really implements those
promises."
Human Rights Watch said China urgently needs to pass a national law barring
discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS, and to create a mechanism through
which victims of discrimination can file complaints.
A 2003 report by Human Rights Watch, Locked Doors: the Human Rights of People
Living with HIV/AIDS, detailed widespread discrimination against people living
with HIV/AIDS, especially by health care facilities. As a result, many with
HIV/AIDS in China live "underground" without access to treatment or care. China
has no national law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of health status,
and local regulations in many areas permit discrimination.
In March, Yunnan province passed new regulations that aim to protect people
living with HIV/AIDS from discrimination. The "Yunnan Province AIDS Prevention
Methods" stipulate severe fines and prison sentences for officials who
discriminate against people living with HIV/AIDS, and underscore the importance
of ensuring access to care.
"The new regulations are an important step forward," said Davis. "The Chinese
leadership and Vice Premier Wu should use them as the basis for a national
law."
Human Rights Watch pointed out that Yunnan and other provinces continue to
detain injection drug users and sex workers, two groups at high risk of HIV
transmission, without trial. In Yunnan, injection drug users are forced to
labor creating batiks and fake jade for sale to the tourist trade. Sex workers,
also at high risk of transmission of HIV, are also forced to work in labor
camps.
"China's policy of administrative detention for injection drug users and sex
workers is driving those people underground, and away from government agencies
that might help protect them from HIV transmission," Davis said.
This month, Wu promised "severe punishment" to any official who covers up the
extent of the AIDS epidemic.
Human Rights Watch said the Chinese government has yet to hold Henan officials
accountable for a scandal in which perhaps a million or more villagers
contracted HIV through blood collection centers run by health department
officials and their relatives in the 1990s. Henan Communist Party officials
covered up the epidemic for years, harassing protestors and expelling Chinese
and international journalists.
"No official has been jailed for the Henan scandal," said Davis. "Worse, some
of the officials who profited from the blood scandal and who covered up AIDS in
Henan have been promoted. We suggest Wu begin her new accountability policy
with them."
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