Daqing strikes gold with diabetes prevention study

by Michael Woodhead
The oil town of Daqing in north China is now becoming famous for something quite different - preventing diabetes. 
Results from a 23-year study conducted in the city have show that people at risk of diabetes can avoid progressing to the disease and almost halve their risk of death by adopting a healthier diet and doing more exercise.
The findings from the study, published in the Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology this week have been hailed as a breakthough by international experts because they answer many of the difficult questions about how diabetes may be prevented and its harms minimised.
The study started in 1986, when 577 people with impaired glucose tolerance were assigned to either an intervention group that received advice on diet and/or exercise, or a control group. The lifestyle coaching sessions lasted for six years during which participants received regular encouragement to eat more vegetables and consume less sugar and alcohol, and encouraged them to do more physical activity in their spare time.
Now after more than 20 years of follow up, researchers have found that the people who received the lifestyle advice had a cardiovascular death rate of 1% compared to 20% in the control group. The overall death rate was 28% in the lifestyle group compared to 38% in the control group. Rates of progression to diabetes were 73% in the lifestyle group and 90% in the control group.
"These findings emphasise the long-term clinical benefits of lifestyle intervention for patients with impaired glucose tolerance and provide further justification for adoption of lifestyle interventions as public health measures to control the consequences of diabetes," said lead study author Professor Li Guangwei of the Department of Endocrinology at the China-Japan Friendship Hospital, Beijing.
Commenting on the findings, Professor Nicholas Wareham of Cambridge University said the study was a "real breakthrough, showing that lifestyle intervention can reduce the risk of long-term cardiovascular consequences of diabetes." He said the study showed that lifestyle change could be achieved in the real world and it was notable that the effects were particularly strong in women.

Breaking news - China medical news in brief

by Michael Woodhead
Genetic sequencing to reveal inherited traits such as high risk breast cancer gene BRCA1 has been banned in China until adequate standards can be set, the Beijing News reports. The order was made by the China Food and Drug Administration (SFDA) and the National Health and Family Planning Commission. An official said DNA sequencing was being promoted by some clinics and companies at the costs of thousands of yuan to detect conditions such as cancer, but the testing technology had not been authorised or verified and the charges not standardised.

Rural patients with dementia or depression have death rates three to four times higher than those of their urban counterparts, a study from Anhui has found.

A shortage of blood group O supplies in Beijing has caused the cancellation of elective surgery for many patients. The Beijing Daily reports that a 47-year old man who required cardiac surgery had his operation postponed because there was no blood group O available, only the more common B group. The man's family tried to donate blood but they found they were all group B. A return to the man's home town to try find donors from friends and family also proved unsuccessful. The man and his family resorted to placing adverts in the Beijing newspapers to try solicit blood donations. Doctors said the New year period was always a time of blood donor shortages as the traditional sources of blood donation - students - went home for extended periods.

Chinese people are subject to far too many useless, dangerous and wasteful medical tests in routine check-ups, an article Global Times claims. Citing the experiences of a visiting US physician, the Times asks why so many tests such as X-rays are offered as art of compulsory regular medical check for employment and other purposes when there is little scientific evidence to support them. Chinese clinicians agreed, putting much of the blame on private clinics which they said offered 'warmer service' but which exaggerated the risk of illness and the need for investigations. Clinic staff often act more like sale people than doctors and they offer unnecessary tests to an unwary public who do not have the medical knowledge to make an informed decision, the experts said. One group  has estimated that the health checks market will be worth 300 billion yuan ($49.44 billion) by 2020.

TCM fails for migraine | Quit advice ineffective | Rural migrants need HIV help

Chinese herbal medicines ineffective in migraine
Chinese herbal patent medicines are used by about 60% of people in China with migraines, but satisfaction rates with the effects are low, and western medicines prove much more effective, a study from Guangzhou has found. In a survey of 219 patients with migraine, researchers found that 58% had used Chinese patent medicines to treat acute attacks, but only 28% reported being satisfied with the results. About 35% reported being unsatisfied. In contrast, about 60% of patients were satisfied with the response they got from western medicines such as NSAIDs for migraine.  The most commonly used Chinese herbal medicines were ones containing L. wallichii, Dahurian angelica root, and G. elata. Interestingly, few Chinese migraine patients used the triptans, which are recognised internationally as being the most effective treatments for migraine, according to the article in Pain Medicine.
 
Quit advice not working
 Smoking cessation counselling is effective for Chinese smokers who have developed COPD but has little influence on asymptomatic smokers, research from Changsha has found. After receiving smoking cessation counselling, smoking abstinence rates at six months were 40% for people with COPD but only 10% for asymptomatic smokers, according to a research group from the Department of Respiratory Disease at the Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha.

Rural migrants missed in HIV prevention
HIV is likely to spread in China via migrant labourers and housemaids, who have low levels of knowledege about the disease and high rates of unsafe sex, researchers from Fudan University in Shanghai have warned. In a survey of 2700 rural migrants they found that more than 40% were ignorant of the facts and risks of HIV, and  6.2% had engaged in high-risk sex in the past 12 months. Only 3% of migrant workers had access to free HIV screening. Writing in BMC Public Health he researchers said migrants must be targeted with tailored educational programs pitched at a level they can understand. Rural migrants should  also be given free condoms and given access to HIV testing and antiretroviral treatment, they urged.

China's medical experts warn about marketing of regular CT scan check-ups

by Michael Woodhead
Medical experts have warned Chinese consumers to reject the marketing hype for the latest craze of having six monthly health check-ups using PET-CT scanners.
Many medical clinics are "jumping on the bandwagon" and using advertising to promote the inappropriate and dangerous use of high end scanners, say radiotherapy specialists at leading hospitals.
Adverts urge consumers to have six monthly CT scans, claiming the advanced technology will detect fast-growing tumours that would escape detection by other health checks or from symptoms alone, accordingto a report in the People's Daily.
However, Dr Lin Hongwei, a cancer specialist at Beijing's Qinhua University Changgeng Hospital said the promotion of PET-CT scan was inappropriate and potentially harmful. He said PET-CT scans delivered a high dose of radiation and should only be used in monitoring existing tumours and for detetion of certain difficult tumours. There was no role for CT scanning in screening of the general population, and anyusch ue was in contravention of current guidelines, he warned.
"The use of expensive PET-CT scans for regular check ups is inappropriate, it is a waste of resources and also can do harm to the patient," he said.

China considers national indoor smoking bans

China is planning a national regulation banning smoking in public indoor areas, and it is expected to be enacted next year, the Beijing News said Thursday, citing an official.
Yang Jie, deputy director of Tobacco Control Office for the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, made the remarks at a news briefing on the Chinese version of the Tobacco Atlas (fourth edition), a comprehensive volume of research on tobacco and smokers.
Yang said the regulation, following the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, will ban smoking in all public places, including public vehicles, indoor workplaces, Internet bars and restaurants. Specific penalties for violations will be included in the regulation, he added.
More than 10 Chinese cities currently have smoking control rules, all of which ban smoking in public indoor areas, but implementation of the law is unsatisfactory, mostly because there is a lack of enforcement and awareness about the law.
The Tobacco Atlas, published by the American Cancer Society, says more than half of Chinese males smoke, and 12 percent of deaths in Chinese males can be attributed to tobacco. Every year, 600,000 people die from exposure to secondhand smoke in China, most of them women and children, it said.
Source: Beijing News

Elderly Beijingers miss out on free flu vaccine

by Michael Woodhead

Most elderly people in Beijing are failing to take advantage of the government’s program of free influenza vaccine each winter, research shows.

Only 44% of people over 60 had influenza vaccination during the seasons from 2008 to 2011, according to a survey of almost 2500 elderly Beijing residents published in the BMJ Open journal this week.

The vaccination rates over three seasons were consistently below 50%, which is well below the WHO target of 75% for annual seasonal influenza vaccination for the elderly, said Dr Zheng Yang and co-researchers from the Institute for Infectious Disease and Endemic Disease Control at the Beijing Center for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC).

The low uptake of flu vaccine occurred despite the government policy to offer the vaccine free of charge to all vulnerable populations including older people via community health centres, the researchers said.

Analysis of the figures showed that flu vaccination was more likely among people living in rural areas of Beijing, people with a lower level of education and those who perceived themselves to be unwell.

“Influenza vaccine coverage in Beijing still remains suboptimal. Further work needs to be undertaken to ascertain whether the method of distributing the vaccine is adequate and whether health professionals are appropriately promoting the vaccine,” the researchers concluded.

“ Education efforts should continue to highlight the need for the vaccine among individuals who are at risk from the disease and its associated complications,” they added.

Read the full study at: BMJ Open

Chinese experts call for more focus on tobacco control

As health is the people's top priority, the Chinese government should do more to control tobacco, experts say.

At a three-day seminar on tobacco control that ended on Thursday in Beijing, Hu Angang, director of the Research Center for Contemporary China at Tsinghua University, said tobacco is the biggest killer in China, and it is not just a public health issue, but involves the sustainable development of the whole nation.

While the government works on economic renewal, transformation of tobacco industry must be addressed and the tobacco supply reduced, Hu said.

China is the world's largest cigarette producer and consumer. The number of smokers exceeds 300 million, with at least 740 million nonsmokers regularly exposed to secondhand smoke.

Zhi Xiuyi, head of the Lung Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment Center of the Capital Medical University, said the top four killers in China, namely cardiovascular disorders, malignant tumors, respiratory disorders and heart disease, are all related to tobacco.

In 2003, China signed the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and it became effective in January 2006. The FCTC requires a reduction in tobacco supply as well as consumption. The 12th Five-Year plan (2011-2015) promised to ban smoking in public places.

Experts are widely critical of the current government effort, describing it as lagging far behind the FCTC standard, and no national law is yet in place banning smoking in indoor public places.

Wang Qingbin, associate professor with the China University of Political Science and Law, believes that although local rules were established in 2007 in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Harbin, and other cities,enforcement has been far from satisfactory.

"There are no clear punishment clauses in most of the regulations, and even in cities with punitive stipulations, only a few fines were issued. The responsible departments simply turn a blind eye because they don't have enough money to hire special staff," he said.

Last December, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), the Ministry of Health and six other government departments  released the China Tobacco Control Program (2012-2015), to reduce tobacco use and reduce tobacco planting. The program is the first at state level  on tobacco control, and marked a new phase for comprehensive tobacco control.

Angela Pratt, a technical officer with the Tobacco Free Initiative of the WHO Representative Office in China, called for more government effort on banning tobacco advertising, graphic warnings on cigarette packs, and raising taxes.

"These measures are included in the FCTC, have proved effective in other countries and helped saved millions of lives," she said.

Source: China Daily

China medical news roundup for Thursday 14 November

Beijing cardiologist uses microblog to educate a wider audience

On the walls of the inpatient wards of Beijing Anzhen Hospital, a large sign reads, "Please follow Yu Zhenqiu's micro blog for hypertension intervention".

Yu, the director of the hypertension department, said the micro blog helps him reach as many sufferers of high blood pressure as possible. Within his working hours, he can see no more than 30 patients even if he skips lunch.

"For the great majority who cannot see top specialty doctors like me at the country's large key hospitals, micro blogs might offer help."

His frequent postings on high blood pressure prevention and intervention tips, and answers to frequently asked questions, have brought Yu about 70,000 followers on Sina Weibo, a popular micro-blogging website.

Apart from information on free-hypertension consultation sessions, he also replies to questions online.

"Many of my postings have been forwarded thousands of times, a result that could never be achieved by treating patients in the hospital," he said.

Writing posts is now a daily routine for him, such as washing his face and brushing his teeth, he said.

Yu, who is also deputy director of the China Hypertension Association, used traditional media first to share prevention and treatment tips and educational items about the disease, before moving online.

Full article at: China Daily

Chinese parents won't take sick kids to small hospitals

With a shortage of pediatricians and inadequate medical facilities, bringing children to hospital can cause a lot of stress to parents. Some experts have suggested a change in parents' attitude and adoption of an alternative medical model. Liu Zhihua reports.

There is a shortage of at least 200,000 pediatricians in China currently, according to K. K. Cheng, a professor with University of Birmingham, who specializes in epidemiology and the development of primary care in China.

Yang Dan, a Chongqing resident and mother to a 3-year-old boy says she detests taking her child to the hospital.

The air circulation is poor. The area is noisy. It is so overcrowded that parents have to hold their children in their arms for intravenous infusion procedures. There have been cases of parents losing their children in the disorganized environment.

Yet sending their children to small hospitals is out of the question, because they cannot provide quality healthcare, Yang believes. She says once her son was misdiagnosed even in the largest hospital in Ya'an, a medium-size city in Sichuan province.

With the disparity in healthcare quality between rural and urban regions, between a top-level hospital and a less-privileged one, most Chinese parents share the belief that small hospitals are incompetent.

Read more at China Daily

China lags on preventive health, says WHO

China should do more to curb a rise in non-communicable diseases like heart disease and diabetes that have long been neglected and now pose a risk to its economy, global health experts warned.

Non-communicable diseases challenge China’s economic development and cause a burden on society, said Bernhard Schwartländer, the World Health Organization’s representative in China, in a press briefing on Tuesday. “The cost of inaction, of doing nothing—in lives lost and social and economic prosperity foregone—is too great a price to pay,” he said.

He was joined by representatives of China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission and China’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Dr. Schwartländer said that high rates of smoking, lack of exercise and unhealthy diets have contributed to diseases. He said that the Chinese government should adopt policies to address problems, which have been overlooked and underfunded.

By 2015, the burden of death and health complications related to non-communicable disease will have cost $500 billion in the last decade, Dr. Schwartlander said. Reducing mortality only by addressing cardiovascular disease, reducing rates 1% per year in by 2040, would generate $10.7 trillion, he said.

Health care was largely left out of a reform agenda Chinese leaders revealed on Tuesday, though it briefly mentioned improving people’s welfare and strengthening reform of the medical and health system. China launched in 2009 an overhaul of its health-care system, establishing a universal insurance system to provide citizens more access to medical care.

China is struggling to deal with a population that is urbanizing, aging and is afflicted with chronic disease. Migration of millions of Chinese citizens to big cities from rural regions has spurred use of cigarettes, higher alcohol intake and increasingly sedentary lifestyles—all habits that lend to illness.

Now China is home to the world’s largest diabetes population, with the prevalence of 11.6% of the population-surpassing Russia’s population, said Li Guangwei, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences. Chronic disease is the cause of 85% of deaths in China, according to China’s Ministry of Health. By comparison, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the rate is 70 per 100 in the U.S., while the World Health Organization says they represent 63% of deaths world-wide.

Funding remains a major issue, experts said. China’s health spending as a percent of GDP totaled 2.3% in 2011, compared to U.S. spending of 9.7%, according to the most recent data available from the World Bank.

Community clinics are overrun with patients and lack resources needed to address health problems, said Wang Bin, the deputy director the Disease Control and Prevention department of China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission.

Tobacco control remains underfunded, said Jiang Yuan, deputy director of the Tobacco Control Office of China’s CDC. The government allocated only 20 million yuan (about $3.3 million) last year for tobacco control, Ms. Jiang said.

Dr. Schwartländer said it isn’t likely that the China will reach the target set for it by the WHO to cut smoking rates in China by at least 30% by 2025. Currently 28% of people older than 15—301 million people—are smokers in China and smoking-related sickness kills more than one million Chinese citizens each year, according to WHO data. That compares to 43.8 million smokers in the U.S., according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Experts said that the government should not shoulder all the responsibilities to improve health conditions and that citizens should adopt healthier lifestyles by eating less salt, exercising more and cutting bad habits like smoking and drinking . “People are the owners of their own health,” said Dr. Wang, adding, “We’re at an important window in China.”

Source: WSJ

MSG may protect against diabetes: Nanjing study

A Jiangsu nutrition study has made the intriguing finding that MSG intake is inversely related to risk of hyperglycaemia.

Researchers from the Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Nanjing conducted a prospective dietary study of 1056 healthy adults from 2002 to 2007. Fasting blood samples were collected at baseline and follow up. Hyperglycemia was defined as fasting plasma glucose >5.6 mmol/l.

During the follow-up they identified 125 cases of hyperglycemia and found that people with the highest intakes of MSG had a lower risk of hyperglycemia. People with a high MSG intake, had only one third the risk of hyperglycemia compared with people with a low intake of MSG, they found. There was a linear inverse association between MSG intake and change in blood glucose.

The researchers noted that MSG stimulates insulin secretion by acting on glutamate receptors and is especially likely to decrease the risk of hyperglycemia in overweight-related insulin resistance.

“However, based on this single study we do not recommend people increase MSG intake in order to prevent diabetes,” they commented.

Read the full study at: Clinical Nutrition

Anhui man on trial for urologist stabbing

An Anhui Province man has been accused of stabbing a doctor at a Songjiang district hospital that he believed had cheated him, district prosecutors said Tuesday.
The suspect, surnamed Huang, visited a military-run hospital in the district in 2012 to see a urologist, according to a press release from the Songjiang District People's Prosecutor's Office. The doctor found a cyst and advised Huang that he would need to have surgery to remove it or face potential health problems in the future.
Huang agreed, though reluctantly. The surgery cost him more than 20,000 yuan ($3,283), including the four-day hospital stay afterward. Several months later, Huang had recovered from the surgery, but still doubted whether it had been necessary, prosecutors said. He suspected that the urologist only suggested the surgery to help the hospital make money.
In April, Huang returned to the hospital seeking treatment for stomach pain. Another doctor prescribed him medication, but it failed to relieve his discomfort after more than 10 days. When Huang went back to complain, the doctor said that it might take more time for the medication to take effect.
Huang believed that the doctor was lying to him and only wanted his money, prosecutors said. He complained to the local health authority and to police, but nothing came of it.
In May, Huang returned to the hospital with a knife and stabbed the urologist, prosecutors said. He then went looking for the other doctor who treated him, but was stopped by hospital security guards. The urologist suffered minor injuries.
Huang confessed to stabbing the doctor and admitted that he had been unhappy with the hospital's care. 

Source: Global Times

What hope for preventing cervical cancer in China with no access to Pap tests or HPV vaccine?

An inflatable uterus in a Shanghai park aims to raise awareness of women's health

by Xuyang Jingjing
As World Cancer Day is celebrated on February 4, it is a sad reality that potentially life-saving cervical cancer vaccines are being kept from the Chinese mainland due to tight import restrictions and testing requirements. 


HPV types 16 and 18 are responsible for about 70 percent of cervical cancer cases. 

HPV vaccines have been available in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan since late 2006. But for vaccines, or any new imported drugs, to be sold in the mainland, new clinical trials have to be performed on mainland residents. Then the drugs are re-evaluated and reviewed by the State Food and Drug Administration before they can be imported, according to regulations.

 Some women who are aware of the vaccines and have the means to do so choose to get inoculated in Hong Kong. There are also many agencies that help mainland women book appointments in Hong Kong hospitals. Such procedures usually come in at around HK$3,000.

 Both Gardasil and Cervarix are given in a series of three shots over the span of six months, which means women have to travel back and forth. They could also take the other two shots back home and get injected at a local clinic, but strictly speaking this is illegal since the vaccines are not yet approved for the mainland. 


Zhou Zijun, professor with the School of Public Health of Peking University, said the purpose of such barriers is to protect the Chinese people while noting that every country has its own set of standards and procedures when approving imported drugs. This also serves to protect domestic pharmaceutical companies. 

But many doctors argue that these regulations are too stringent and may be keeping some good medicines out. The tests done in Hong Kong and Taiwan should have been sufficient, said Gong Xiaoming, a gynecologist at Beijing Union Medical College Hospital.

 He gave another example of an overseas pharmaceutical company that estimated it would cost around 100 million yuan ($16 million) to do all the clinical trials and evaluations to introduce a drug for ovarian cancer to the mainland, ultimately deciding it wasn't worth it and shelving the launch. 


"We should have standards when importing new drugs, but right now it seems the threshold is too high and is preventing us from using some good drugs," said Gong.

 The two vaccines started clinical trials in China around 2007. The first two stages of clinical trials have been concluded and have proven the safety of the vaccine. The third stage has been going since 2009, aiming to test the efficacy of the vaccines. But it could still take years, experts say.

 In the meantime, Chinese pharmaceutical companies have also started clinical trials for domestically-produced HPV vaccines. But it is unclear when any of these will start to be sold on the mainland.
Statistics from the Ministry of Health in 2011 showed over 130,000 new cases of cervical cancer in China each year, accounting for about one-fifth of all new cases worldwide. This translates to about 30,000 women in China dying of cervical cancer each year.

 n China, cervical cancer usually occurs among women over 35 years old, especially between the ages of 45 and 49, according to research carried out by Qiao Youlin, a leading oncologist and a professor at the Cancer Institute and Hospital of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences.

 Worryingly, recent years have seen reports indicating that the disease is becoming increasingly prevalent among women in their 20s.

 Most cervical cancer cases occur in central and western areas such as Shanxi, Shaanxi and Hunan, and more so in rural areas than in cities, according to a report released by the Center for Cancer Registry in January.


Besides vaccination, regular screenings are crucial for the early detection and treatment of cervical cancer. However, the biggest problem at the moment is that the general public, especially those in rural or poverty-stricken areas, lack awareness about the disease and the importance of getting regularly tested, said Gong. 


Chinese authorities have also been trying to raise awareness of breast and cervical cancer and have launched programs to promote screening. 

Between 2009 and 2011, China invested over 350 million yuan to screen for breast cancer and cervical cancer among women aged between 35 and 59 in rural areas. Over 11 million rural women were tested for cervical cancer and the country aimed to screen another 10 million in 2012. Whether this program was successful remains unknown.

 Despite the government's effort to promote screening, not enough is being done to ensure that the hundreds of millions of women who need the test are all able to receive it.

 The commonly used screening technique, the pap smear test, detects pre-cancerous and cancerous processes in the cervical canal. It requires skilled doctors to analyse cells for cancerous changes and is therefore more suited to developed countries where medical staff have decades of experience. 

It takes over 10 years to train a doctor qualified to diagnose the disease from the test, but China lacks both the training system and qualified doctors, according to Qiao. 

In 2008, Qiao and scientists from other countries announced in a paper published in The Lancet Oncology that they had developed a new test, named careHPV, to detect 14 high-risk types of HPV in about 2.5 hours.

 It took the team five years to develop the new test, which is considerably cheaper and faster than the currently used pap smear or HPV DNA tests. It is also much easier for medical workers to master. The new test, based on the Hybrid Capture 2 technology, is designed for low-resource areas and works in environments that lack water, electricity or modern equipment.

Qiao said that the new test has just been approved by the State Food and Drug Administration last year and will enter mass production soon. 

In 2011, the Cancer Foundation of China launched a research program that aims to prevent cervical cancer in ethnic minority areas. An ethnic minority county would be chosen respectively from Inner Mongolia, Yunnan and Sichuan where about 6,000 girls between 13 and 15 years of age would be inoculated with HPV vaccines.

 Qiao is hoping that the medical community in China could push for the vaccines to get approved as early as possible. "We are already seven years late. Who knows how many people have been affected during that time?" said Qiao.
Source: Global Times

Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) works with US counterpart

by Dr Tom Frieden, CDC Director
 For more than 30 years, the US CDC has worked with China on public health issues that have benefited people of all nations.
Together our nations proved the benefits of folic acid which saved children around the world from birth defects. We are exploring novel approaches to HIV prevention, testing and treatment. We are researching risk factors for cardiovascular disease – one of the world’s leading causes of death. Along with other nations, China and the US are working together on influenza surveillance to better protect the world.
This week, I had an opportunity to discuss these achievements with my colleague Dr. WANG Yu, Director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC). The US CDC and China CDC Directors meet annually to decide our mutual priorities, explore ways to share what we’ve learned with other nations and expand upon our collaborative successes. This was the tenth anniversary of the US-China CDC Directors meeting which allowed for reflection on a few key 10-year benchmarks.
China has made great strides in public health over the past decade. In 2003, the world was in the grip of SARS which began in China and resulted in sweeping changes to global public health response. In 2013, China is actively strengthening its domestic public health detection and response system. Ten years ago, US CDC began to work in China on its growing HIV/AIDS pandemic. Now, Chinese HIV/AIDS clinics are testing innovative point-of-care technologies that will be distributed globally to use in other nations in their fight against AIDS. In 2001, US CDC’s Field Epidemiology Training Program began helping China CDC to build a force of disease detectives to identify and control domestic disease outbreaks.
Ten years later, China expanded its contribution to the global effort to eradicate polio by joining the Stop the Transmission of Polio (STOP) vaccination teams. Ten years ago, China had only eight sentinel hospitals conducting virologic influenza surveillance and a single national laboratory. Throughout the next decade, US CDC supported its partners in China CDC to improve the quantity and quality of its surveillance sites. In 2013, China’s influenza network spans 554 sentinel hospitals and 409 laboratories and is one of only five WHO Collaborating Centres for Influenza Reference and Research in the world.
US CDC congratulates China and its public health professionals for making a world of difference. Collaborating with China provides US CDC unprecedented opportunities to work with the largest population in the world on public health approaches that benefit the people of China, the US and the world.
Source: CDC Blog

AIDS-related deaths up by 9% in China

The number of new cases of HIV in China has increased by almost 13% this year

China's health authority announced on Wednesday that 17,740 AIDS-related deaths were reported in the country from January to October, a year-on-year increase of 8.6 percent.
As those living with HIV have become AIDS patients over time,AIDS-related deaths are on the rise, according to the Ministry of Health (MOH).
The MOH said the latest figures show that 34,157 new cases of AIDS were reported in China in the ten-month period, up by 12.7 percent year-on-year.
HIV rates have risen among people aged 15 to 24 and those over 50.
From January to October, 16,131 new cases of HIV infections among citizens over 50 were reported, marking a year-on-year increase of 20.2 percent.
There were also 9,514 new cases of HIV reported among young people aged 15 to 24, up 12.8 percent year on year, according to figures from the MOH.
The MOH said the HIV/AIDS epidemic is rampant in some locations and among certain groups of people.
In total, China reported 492,191 cases of HIV/AIDS by the end of October, including 68,802 new cases this year, according to the MOH.
Sexual transmission has become the primary channel of HIV/AIDS spreading. Sex between men registered a sharp increase, said the MOH.
Out of the new cases of HIV within the ten month period, 84.9 percent contracted the virus through sexual intercourse.
According to China's AIDS Action Plan for the 12th Five-Year Program period (2011-2015) published by the State Council, or China's Cabinet, in February, the country aims to decrease AIDS fatalities by 30 percent by 2015, and new cases by 25 percent as compared to 2010.
Since the end of 2003, the Chinese government has carried out the policy "four frees, one care" for people living with HIV/AIDS. This includes free blood tests for those with HIV, free education for orphans of AIDS patients, free consultation and screening tests, and free antiretroviral therapy for pregnant women.
Read more: Eastday

Call for urgent action over soaring HIV rates in gay men in Beijing

One in twenty gay men in Beijing developed HIV during a year

 by Michael Woodhead

Urgent action is needed to tackle skyrocketing rates of HIV infection among gay men in Beijing, Chinese experts say.
Researchers from the Chaoyang Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, assessed the HIV and STD infection incidence among 797 men who have sex with men in Beijing who were initial HIV-negative in 2009.
After about one year, they found that 48 men (6%) had developed HIV infection, equivalent to a rate of  8 cases per 100 person years. For syphilis, 30 of 666 (4%) gay men developed infection, and for herpes 46 of 760 men developed HSV-2 infection during the follow up period.
The risk of HIV infection was highest in younger men (under 25), those who had more than one sexual partner and men with a lower educational level.
The researchers say theirs is the first large study to measure the incidence of HIV among gay men in Beijing and the results "indicate that the HIV incidence rate among MSM has increased dramatically."
They say Beijing has an "extremely high rate" of HIV infection compared with other cities in both China and around the world.
"Explanations for the exceptionally high and steady rise in HIV incidence among Beijing [gay men] are not entirely clear, but one possibility may be that Beijing's relatively vibrant [gay] culture facilitates greater disassortative sexual mixing between gay groups, which in turn can increase HIV background prevalence. The high HIV incidence rate and prevalence among MSM in Beijing indicate that the epidemic in this group is extremely serious and that effective intervention services are urgently needed," says Dr Li Dongliang and co-researchers
They add: "Given the synergistic relationship between STD and HIV infection, interventions for high-risk behaviours and treatment and management for STDs should be combined with HIV control and prevention initiatives among MSM in China. We believe data from this study will help guide future research towards innovative STD/HIV interventions for MSM in China, and mobilise government, public health and non-governmental communities to control the rapid transmission of HIV and STDs among Chinese MSM. Comprehensive actions are urgently needed and the time is now."
Read more: BMJ Open