China to make more efforts in HIV prevention

BEIJING - China on Tuesday vowed to make more efforts in HIV prevention, and help strengthen global cooperation in this regard.

"China will strengthen cooperation with international organizations and help HIV prevention services in countries with high prevalence," said Vice Premier Li Keqiang in a meeting with UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Michel Sidibe in downtown Beijing.

Li added that the Chinese government will encourage and support non-governmental organizations and volunteers to actively take part in HIV prevention campaigns in the country.

The government will also support the media to strengthen public education and supervision in this regard, Li said.

According to the vice premier, China has curbed the fast spread of HIV, and reduced the related death rate. China will be able to realize the HIV prevention goal under the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015, he said.

The actual number of people living with HIV/AIDS in China is predicted to hit 780,000 by the end of 2011, with 48,000 new infections and 28,000 deaths this year, according to the Ministry of Health.

In this February, China issued its AIDS Action Plan for the 12th Five-Year Program period (2011-2015). It will further strengthen AIDS public education, monitoring and test, treatment, intervention, and prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV. It will also increase medicine for anti-virus and opportunistic infection treatment.

Speaking highly of China's efforts in HIV prevention, Sidibe said he hoped China would play a bigger role in promoting the south-south cooperation in the fight against HIV.

On Tuesday morning, Sidibe gave an award to President of the Xinhua News Agency Li Congjun at the Great Hall of the People, in recognition of Li's outstanding leadership and innovative spirit in promoting HIV prevention around the world. Li is the first global prize winner.

The Leaders and Innovators Award is a new UNAIDS award to honor individuals or institutions that make exemplary contributions to the global campaign on the "three-zeroes" vision set forth by UNAIDS -- namely, zero new infections, zero discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS and zero HIV/AIDS-related deaths.