National HIV/AIDS training center launched in Yunan
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-08-11 15:25

A state-run HIV/AIDS training center has been put into operation recently in southwest China's Yunnan Province to professionalize medical staff in the fight against the fatal disease, sources with the Ministry of Public Health said.

Fully sponsored by the Chinese government, the center is among the first six of such organizations to be established across the country.

The other five training centers locate in Beijing and Shanghai municipalities and the provinces of Liaoning, Hubei and Sichuan.

Each of the six training bases will provide professional education for 5-6 of their neighboring provinces and regions on the treatment of HIV carriers and AIDS patients in a bid to achieve more effective result in consultation, diagnosis, treatment, and assistance in HIV/AIDS prevention and control.

Their main tasks of the year will focus on the prevention of HIV infection and early intervention, including programs of confining the spread of HIV/AIDS among hard-drug users and prostitutes with encouragement of using sterilized injectors and condoms.

Yunnan HIV/AIDS training center, based in the Yunnan Center forDisease Control and Prevention (Yunnan CDC), serves a region that includes Guizhou, Hainan and Guangdong provinces and Guanxi Zhuang autonomous region, said Lu lin, director of the CDC.

"Yunnan is one of the regions that suffer most from the disease and the HIV/AIDS situation here is serious now," said Lu.

China has earmarked 29 million yuan (3.6 million US dollars) last year in the establishment of traditional Chinese medicine treatment centers for HIV/AIDS victims, statistics from the Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine show.

In addition to offering free treatment to AIDS patients, the centers also research on the effects of traditional Chinese medicine on the deadly disease.