AIDS now China's deadliest infectious disease: govt
Pastor Dale Morgan
AIDS now China's deadliest infectious disease: govt*
China actually had an estimated 700,000 HIV/AIDS carriers in 2007, with
an estimated 85,000 people infected that year, according to the ministry.
by Staff Writers
Beijing (AFP) Feb 18, 2009
AIDS has become China's deadliest infectious disease for the first time,
the government said, with figures showing at least one person died on
average every hour in the first nine months of last year.
AIDS overtook tuberculosis and rabies as the country's number one
disease killer in 2008, the health ministry said in a report released on
Tuesday.
Although full-year figures were not released, the ministry said the
6,897 people who died from AIDS from January to September made it the
deadliest infectious disease.
It said 34,864 people had died from AIDS since it was first detected in
China in the 1980s. A total of 264,302 people were confirmed to have
contracted the HIV virus that leads to AIDS, the report said.
However those figures are a vast underestimate of the true picture, as
the tally refers only to confirmed incidents of the condition.
China actually had an estimated 700,000 HIV/AIDS carriers in 2007, with
an estimated 85,000 people infected that year, according to the ministry.