content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/356/18/1801 NEJM -- China and HI...

NEJM -- China and HIV -- A Window of Opportunity FREE NEJM E-TOC HOME | SUBSCRIBE | CURRENT ISSUE | PAST ISSUES | COLLECTIONS | Search Term Advanced Search Please sign in for full text and personal services A correction has been published: N Engl J Med 2007;357(8):835. Volume 356:1801-1805May 3, 2007Number 18 Next China and HIV — A Window of Opportunity Bates Gill, Ph.D., and Susan Okie, M.D. PDF PDA Full Text Audio Interview Slide Presentation Add to Personal Archive Add to Citation Manager Notify a Friend E-mail When Cited E-mail When Letters Appear Related Article Last December in Wuhan, China, two middle-aged rural women who had become infected with HIV in the 1990s struggled to describe to foreign visitors how China s new HIV-treatment program had changed their lives. Suddenly, one woman s 12-year-old daughter spoke up. Her mother, she said, had been too sick to get out of bed, and the girl had left school to help at home and on the farm. But when the woman began taking antiretroviral drugs, she improved quickly, returned to work in the fields, and sent her daughter back to the classroom. Such stories are increasingly common in China, reflecting a striking shift in the government s approach to HIV. Although China s first AIDS cases were discovered in 1989, the government did not publicly acknowledge the existence of a major epidemic until 2001. Two years later, as international attention mounted after the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), the government abruptly changed course, launching aggressive measures against AIDS. An interagency committee was created to coordinate a government-wide response, and a national AIDS treatment program was established. The national budget for HIV–AIDS grew from approximately $12.5 million in 2002 to about $100 million in 2005 and about $185 million in 2006.1 In January 2006, the Chinese Cabinet iss...