Dec05-1

MANILA (Reuters) - Some 10 million people in China may be infected with the AIDS virus by 2010, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday, as it called for stronger political will by Asian governments to stop the spread of the disease.

About 5 million people worldwide were infected last year, bringing to 45 million the number living with the virus despite measures designed to prevent AIDS from spreading, said Shigeru Omi, WHO director for the Western Pacific region.

"We know what works and what doesn't. So why has the necessary action to prevent the virus from spreading not been taken?" Omi said in a statement ahead of the World AIDS Day on Thursday. "Why is the epidemic still growing and not reversing?"

In China, the virus has spread to all 31 provinces and autonomous regions with injected drug use the main route of transmission. A similar situation exists in Malaysia and Vietnam.

If nothing was done to promote HIV prevention, the WHO said, some 10 million Chinese may be infected in the next five years.

Omi called on governments in the region to review progress on the targets set under the Millennium Development Goals and the U.N. General Assembly Declaration in 2001 to cut the prevalence of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, and reverse the epidemic by 2015.

Based on WHO data, more than 25 million people have died of AIDS since 1981, the leading cause of death among those aged 15 to 49 worldwide.

More than 13,000 people contract the virus every day, with drug use and the sex trade as the drivers of the epidemic across the Western Pacific region.

In Asia, Cambodia has the highest HIV prevalence rate at 1.9 percent of the population, with nearly 21 percent of sex workers infected.

Omi said there was still enough time to meet the goals, noting a dramatic 20-fold increase in donor funding for HIV/AIDS since 1996 to $6 billion last year.

He said almost 1 million people in developing countries worldwide were receiving anti-retroviral therapy but that was still short of the target of 3 million by the end of 2005.

China demands stepped-up AIDS prevention drive

BEIJING (Reuters) - The spread of AIDS could damage China's economic development and affect the nation's "rise or decline", the health minister said on Wednesday, stressing the need to take strong preventive measures.

On the eve of World AIDS Day, Minister Gao Qiang said China aimed to keep the total of people infected by the HIV virus that causes AIDS to below 1.5 million by 2010. His forecast was sharply lower than the World Health Organization estimate of 10 million if nothing is done to prevent transmission.

"AIDS prevention work is an issue relating to the quality of the population, economic development, social stability and the rise or decline of the country," Gao told a news conference.

The central government was spending 800 million yuan on AIDS prevention this year, up from 100 million yuan in 2002, the minister said, adding that China was capable of effectively containing the spread of the virus.

The estimated number of Chinese infected with HIV through contaminated blood transfusions was 70,000, he said. China had cut the number of new cases by "striking hard" against illegal blood sales and closing down grassroots blood donation and collection stations, he said.

The number of confirmed HIV cases in China hit 135,630 at the end of September, a rise of 52 percent over a year before, but poor monitoring and official obstruction still obscured the true scale of the epidemic, top AIDS official Wang Longde said on Monday.

But China's vast size and dilapidated health system meant that only a fraction of HIV-positive people were officially diagnosed with the virus, and even fewer received medical treatment for full-blown AIDS.

Vice Premier Wu Yi said this week that the reported total of cases probably represented 16.1 percent of the real number -- which would give China an estimated 840,000 cases.

The U.N. Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS said that number could be anywhere between 430,000 and 1.5 million. Some international groups and Chinese AIDS activists put it in the millions.

Gao said his ministry had drafted a five-year AIDS prevention action plan which was now awaiting cabinet approval.

China's prevention measures included educating students at 90,000 high schools and 2,100 universities and farmers in 740,000 villages, the minister said.

Gao said the government would launch a campaign on Thursday to educate millions of migrant workers, peasants who flock to cities in search of higher-paying jobs. China has boosted official accountability and vowed to prosecute officials for cover-ups which lead to the spread of AIDS, Gao said.

About 2 million people, including drug users, had undergone tests, and about 40,000 tested positive, he said. He did not say over what period the tests were conducted.

China recorded its first outbreak of AIDS in 1989. Last year, between 21,000 and 75,000 Chinese died of AIDS, many of them poor, rural residents who died without treatment or even diagnosis, according to the United Nations.

During the 1990s, many Chinese -- especially in the central province of Henan -- contracted the virus through contaminated blood transfusions.

Cash-strapped peasants sold their blood to professional blood buyers, it was pooled, plasma extracted for medical use and the remainder returned to the donors in pooled batches, meaning that one infected person passed the diseases to others.

Now the means of infection have changed. Today, 40.8 percent of confirmed cases were infected through intravenous drug injections, 9 percent through sexual transmission, 23 percent through blood selling and 23.4 percent were of uncertain origin.

China urges HIV tests amid warnings of another AIDS crisis

BEIJING (AFP) - The Chinese government urged its citizens to get tested for HIV, as activists warned the country faced another AIDS crisis surrounding people who contracted the disease from blood transfusions.

"We encourage our citizens to have HIV virus tests in qualified institutions," Health Minister Gao Qiang told a news conference on the eve of World AIDS Day.

"We don't want to see the scenario... where a mother who got AIDS passes it to her child."

It was the first time a top government official had called on citizens to get tested, which a Western AIDS expert working in China said was a step forward.

"It's very significant. It means they're working with HIV positive people seriously," said the expert who requested anonymity.

The Chinese government admitted for the first time in 2001 that the nation had an AIDS problem, while also acknowledging a scandal involving poor farmers getting the disease from selling blood in state-approved schemes.

But it has said little about those who contracted AIDS from the nation's unsafe blood supply, which activists say is a growing concern.

Doctors in the countryside as well as in smaller cities bought blood from blood sellers instead of blood banks up until the late 1990s.

Even the blood banks' supply was not entirely safe, as the government did not strictly enforce screening regulations until the past few years.

AIDS activists and victims said patients were now beginning to find out they contracted the disease when doctors gave them transfusions during routine procedures such as cesarean sections or abortions.

Many learned they had contracted the disease only after they had infected their husband and given birth to infected children.

Victims and activists issued a statement at the end of a conference in Beijing Wednesday demanding the government set up a special task force to investigate the scandal and immediately instruct all blood or blood product users from 1987 to 2005 to get tested for HIV.

The group also set up a committee to advocate for the rights and compensation for victims, said the statement from the Beijing AIZHIXING Institute of Health Education, which organized the conference.

"Unlike the farmers in 'AIDS villages' who sold blood, these people are very spread out and don't know each other," said Beijing activist Hu Jia. "They only slowly find out they are HIV positive and that there are others like them."

Gao did not say how many people became infected through transfusions, but admitted the problem existed and expressed sympathy for the victims.

"This problem indeed should raise the government's attention and we should organize specialists and experts to conduct an investigation," Gao said.

He said the government would provide free testing for anyone who wanted to be tested and offer assistance to these "innocent" people.

In another unusual move, Gao also said courts should take up the cases. "We hope cases will be handled in a fair and legal way," Gao said.

Many victims have said local courts are ordered to reject their attempts to seek justice.

China has maintained for years it has 840,000 people who are HIV positive, although independent estimates put the figure much higher.

Gao did not give any new figures on the total number with HIV, but said the government was preparing a new estimate.

He said a recent government study conducted with international groups found only 70,000 Chinese people with full-blown AIDS, about 10,000 less than the previous official figure.

Meanwhile, the health ministry said it will distribute 90,000 AIDS prevention manuals in five ethnic languages to minority people across the nation, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

BEIJING, Nov 28 (Reuters) - China's confirmed cases of HIV rose more than 50 percent in the past year but poor monitoring and official obstruction still obscure the real scale of the AIDS epidemic, the country's top AIDS official said on Monday.

The number of Chinese medically diagnosed with the HIV virus, which leads to AIDS, grew to 135,630 by the end of September, Wang Longde, director of the State Council AIDS Prevention and Treatment Work Committee, told a conference of Chinese health officials ahead of World AIDS Day on Thursday.

But China's vast size and dilapidated health system mean that only a fraction of HIV-positive people are officially diagnosed with the virus, and even fewer of them receive medical treatment for full-blown AIDS.

Vice Premier Wu Yi said that the gap between reported statistics and the real scale of the epidemic threatened to undermine the country's fight against AIDS.

"If we can't do the maximum to locate carriers and sufferers, then we can't do the maximum to implement prevention and treatment measures," Wu said. She said the reported HIV cases probably represented 16.1 percent of the real number -- which would give China an estimated 840,000 cases of the disease.

Wang said local officials continued to cover up cases of HIV infection, fearful that acknowledging the epidemic would harm economic growth and promotion prospects.

"Some localities fear that reporting a rise in reported cases will damage their political standing and local economic development, and they are unwilling to expand testing. And certain areas won't even truthfully report cases," Wang said.

The United Nations Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS has said that number could be anywhere between 430,000 and 1,500,000, and some international groups and Chinese AIDS activists put the figure in the millions.

China recorded its first outbreak of AIDS in 1989. Last year, between 21,000 and 75,000 Chinese died of AIDS, according to the United Nations -- many of them poor, rural residents who died without treatment or even diagnosis.

Officials at Monday's meeting said that as HIV was spreading increasingly through sexual contact, especially prostitution, through intravenous drug use, and from mothers to babies, the virus was more likely to spread throughout the larger population and China would face difficulty containing it.

Wu said that to hold back AIDS, China must expand needle exchange programmes and methadone-based detoxification services for drug users and condom distribution to prostitutes and men who have sex with men.

The infection rate among prostitutes rose from 2 in 10,000 in 1996 to 93 in 10,000 in 2004, Wang said. And in "high-prevalence" areas, such as the rural central province of Henan, 0.26 percent of pregnant women were found to have HIV.

But Wu said local officials wary of being seen as condoning drugs and prostitution were holding back these policies.

"Many of these measures are stuck at the trial stage, and their depth and breadth aren't enough," she said. "There is even obstruction of measures to intervene in these high-risk behaviours, and this has held back prevention and treatment."

During the 1990s, many Chinese -- especially in Henan -- contracted the virus through contaminated blood transfusions. This was a time when cash-hungry peasants sold their blood to professional blood buyers, often accredited by local health agencies or the military.

The blood was pooled, plasma extracted for medical use and the remainder returned to the donors in pooled batches, meaning that one infected person passed the disease to others.

But now 40.8 percent of the confirmed cases were infected through intravenous drug injections, 9.0 percent through sexual transmission, 23.0 through blood selling, and 23.4 percent were of uncertain origin, Wang said.

Wu said these shifting patterns of transmission exposed growing numbers of Chinese to the risk of infection. "HIV in China remains a low-level epidemic, but among certain groups and regions it's become a high-level one, and it's steadily spreading from high-risk groups to the general population," she said.

Chinese blood donor with HIV infects 23 people

Sat Dec 3, 2005 2:36 AM ET

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - A blood donor with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, infected at least 23 people in northeast China's Jilin province before being diagnosed with the disease, state media reported on Saturday.

The infected donor, identified only by the surname Song and living in the city of Dehui, was confirmed to have HIV on October 20 after 25 people had already received the blood, the China Youth Daily said.

One victim, surnamed Wang, died on November 10, 40 days after being confirmed as suffering from AIDS. Wang had received the tainted blood during an operation in March 2003.

The case was uncovered after Wang's relatives reported the death to local authorities, who traced the blood back to Song.

Two other recipients of Song's blood have also died from AIDS, while another 18 have been confirmed to have HIV.

Song's two sex partners, along with one partner's spouse, were also confirmed to carry the virus.

According to the newspaper, Song had been employed but was unable to work after being involved in a car accident more than 10 years ago, and started giving blood for money.

Song gave blood 15 times between January 2003 and June 2004, according to the official Xinhua news agency.

Xinhua said that six health officials in Dehui were either stripped of their leading posts or placed on probation within the Communist Party after the case was uncovered.

In an unrelated case involving HIV in China, a 32-year-old drug addict and HIV carrier in the southern city of Shenzhen was taken into custody after he held a boy hostage and spilled his blood on the child during a standoff with police.

Police had come to question the man after his neighbors claimed he was using his status as an HIV carrier to scare them into giving him money to buy drugs.

The boy was released after three hours of negotiation and taken to a hospital where several small wounds were discovered on his body, the South China Morning Post reported.

He will now have to wait about a week for the results of an initial HIV test, the paper said.

The World Health Organization and the Chinese government said in 2002 that China could have 10 million cases of HIV by 2010, a figure still widely cited.

But earlier this week, the WHO's chief China representative said improved counting and China's steps to contain the disease mean a new assessment of infection rates would be significantly lower.

BEIJING, Dec 1 (Reuters) - Chinese health officials are grappling with when and how to announce new estimates of China's AIDS epidemic and facing an unusual problem: previous estimates may be too high.

But as World AIDS Day passes, U.N. officials said the country still risks a devastating outbreak, with increasing infections through drug use and unprotected sex.

The World Health Organisation and Chinese government said in 2002 that China could have 10 million cases of HIV by 2010 -- a figure still widely cited.

But WHO's chief China representative, Henk Bekedam, said improved counting and China's steps to contain the disease mean a new assessment of infection rates would be significantly lower.

"What we have seen over the past three years is that China has taken action, and we do believe that this is now an old figure," he said, referring to the 10 million figure.

U.N. organisations and Chinese health authorities have been working on a new count, Bekedam said. He declined to disclose the figure but said China would probably announce it in coming weeks.

China's Health Minister Gao Qiang said on Wednesday he would announce the figure at a news conference when a report is done.

Estimates of AIDS' extent in China, which was long secretive about the disease, are clouded by uncertainty and controversy.

While China has improved its testing, it still has a sketchy grasp of how many citizens illegally inject drugs, sell sex or engage in sex between men, said Joel Rehnstrom, the country coordinator for U.N. group UNAIDS in China.

During the 1990s, most of China's AIDS sufferers contracted the disease by selling blood plasma, especially in the central province of Henan.

Now China's increasingly mobile population faces a broader risk as more infections occur through drug injection and sexual contact, said Bekedam.

China's chief AIDS official, Wang Longde, has said medically confirmed HIV infections stood at 135,630 at the end of September -- a 50 percent jump from a year earlier -- but only a fraction of China's likely HIV-positive citizens have ever been tested.

China's health ministry has delayed announcing lower HIV projections partly because it fears encouraging complacency, Rehnstrom said.

Health officials and experts said the key challenge facing China is not the raw number of HIV cases, but the difficulty of containing its spread through groups that are often stigmatised and isolated.

The country's dilapidated and under funded public health system is a root problem in dealing with these risks. "While the commitment is already there, the system at this moment is still rather weak," Bekedam said.

Shanghai to nearly triple number of condom vending machines

Tue Nov 29, 7:53 AM ET

China's largest city Shanghai plans to nearly triple the number of condom vending machines in an effort to promote safe sex and rein in the spread of AIDS.

Shanghai currently has 700 vending machines but aims to add another 1,200, Xinhua news agency reported ahead of World AIDS Day on December 1, citing unnamed family planning officials.

The 1,200 machines will be set up at entertainment venues, in residential communities and places where migrant workers tend to gather, and 200 of them will offer condoms free of charge, Xinhua said.

The agency did not say when the new machines would be up and running.

China estimates it has 840,000 HIV carriers, a number that is widely believed to be outdated. United Nations officials say it could have 10 million carriers by 2010.

'We must do far, far more' against AIDS - Annan

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Around the globe, leaders, activists and victims used World AIDS Day on Thursday to send the message that far stronger action is needed in the battle against the disease that kills millions of people every year.

The United Nation's special envoy for AIDS in Africa proposed big business dedicate a portion of profits to the fight, French President Jacques Chirac suggested schools install condom vending machines and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called on people to talk openly about safe sex.

The number of people living with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, has reached its highest level with an estimated 40.3 million people, UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot said. Nearly half of them are women.

"We must do far, far more," U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said. "It is time to recognise that although our response so far has succeeded in some of the particulars, it has yet to match the epidemic in scale."

Others, including U.S. President George W. Bush, noted what progress had been made. Speaking in Washington, he said U.S. efforts were helping 400,000 people in sub-Saharan Africa get treatment.

With just over 10 percent of the world's population, sub-Saharan Africa is home to more than 60 percent of all people infected with HIV. Africa saw about 3.2 million of the almost 5 million new infections recorded in 2005.

"These countries, and many others, are fighting for the lives of their citizens, and America is now their strongest partner in that fight," he said. The 400,000 getting treatment, he said, was up from 50,000 two years ago.

However, critics including senior U.N. officials say Bush's emphasis on abstinence-only programs has hobbled efforts by playing down the role of condoms.

Taking up the cause of promoting condom use to prevent infection with the HIV virus that causes AIDS, officials in Buenos Aires covered the city's most famous landmark, the obelisk, with a giant pink condom.

"It seemed like we could have the biggest impact by putting a condom on the most important symbol of the city," said Sandra Castillo, an organizer of the campaign.

AIDS killed 66,000 Latin Americans in the past year, according to a U.N. report.

From Vatican City, Pope Benedict said programs based on promoting abstinence and marital fidelity were seeing success, saying "statistics taken in several regions of Africa confirm the results of policies based on continence, the promotion of faithfulness in marriage and the importance of family life."

But the pope did not specify the regions or the statistics, and he avoided a specific mention of the Roman Catholic Church's controversial ban on condoms.

"The international response to HIV and AIDS was woefully slow. This is one of the scars on the conscience of our generation," said U.N. General Assembly President Jan Eliasson in remarks prepared for a ceremony in New York.

"We cannot turn back the clock. But we must ensure that, when historians look at the way the world responded to HIV and AIDS, they see that 2006 was the year when the international community finally stepped up to the mark," he said.

"This vast human tragedy is all the more unacceptable because it could have been avoided."

In New York, activists stood by City Hall and solemnly read the names of deceased AIDS victims aloud. The Empire State Building, typically lit in bright holiday hues of red and green at this time of year, was set to go dark for 15 minutes to mark World AIDS Day.

Stephen Lewis, the U.N. special envoy for AIDS in Africa, called upon on major corporations to contribute 0.7 percent of pretax profits to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS.

The fund "is in terrible trouble" after increases promised by the Group of 8 industrialized nations in July failed to materialise, he said.

"We need a new source of dollars," he said in a statement. "That source must be the private sector."

The United Nations has long called on wealthy nations to donate 0.7 percent of gross domestic product for development aid every year.

African AIDS patients criticized politicians for failing to take adequate measures.

"Money earmarked for HIV/AIDS has gone into everything else but AIDS," said Meris Kafusi, a 64-year-old AIDS patient in Tanzania who only recently began receiving life-prolonging antiretroviral drugs that are widespread in the West.

"Organizations that say they are dealing with AIDS are always in seminars or workshops. They should be buying food for widows and orphans ... Is this fair?"

"The prices charged by pharmaceutical companies, and the policies pursued by rich countries at their behest, continue to keep life-saving treatment out of reach for those most affected by HIV/AIDS," said Salih Booker, Africa Action's executive director.

In India, which says it has 5.13 million people with HIV/AIDS, the second largest number after South Africa, Singh called on people to shed the inhibitions that keep them from talking about sex.

"This, quite obviously, has to change if we are to succeed in creating awareness of the hazards of unsafe sexual practices," he said.

WHO apologises for missing AIDS treatment target

Mon Nov 28, 6:21 AM ET

The World Health Organization apologised on Monday for missing its target to get 3 million people in poor countries on life-saving AIDS drugs by the end of 2005.

Dr Jim Yong Kim, the director of the WHO's HIV/AIDS department, admitted that the WHO had not moved quickly enough to meet its ambitious "3 by 5" target.

"I have to say that I'm personally extremely disappointed in myself and in my colleagues because we have not moved quickly enough -- we have not saved enough lives," Kim told the BBC.

The WHO and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) had hoped to provide 3 million of the 6 million people in poor countries with treatment but the real acceleration in numbers they had hoped for did not materialize.

The exact number of HIV/AIDS sufferers on treatment will be announced early next year. In June, Kim said about 1 million people in poor countries were receiving the drugs.

"All we can do is apologize," he said less than a week before World AIDS Day on December 1.

Although the 3 million mark will not be reached, Kim said he didn't think the initiative had failed because the programme had increased the number of people on antiretroviral drugs and had saved lives.

Because of the "3 by 5" initiative, many more countries had joined the programme and provided access to AIDS drugs.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the region worst affected by HIV/AIDS, about half a million people were receiving treatment by the middle of 2005. Although it was a three-fold increase in the last year, it was still only about 15 percent of those who need it.

People on treatment in Asia had risen from 55,000 to 155,000 since June 2004, while in eastern Europe and central Asia people on treatment nearly doubled in a year to 20,000, according to the "3 by 5" update report issued in June.

Kim said before the initiative there were no targets for treatment or for preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS, which killed 3.1 million people in 2005.

More than 40 million people worldwide are living with HIV/AIDS, according to latest figures from UNAIDS.

UN urges "exceptional response" to AIDS crisis

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - The United Nations used World AIDS Day on Thursday to call for an "exceptional response" to the global crisis as African patients criticized politicians for failing to tackle a disease that kills millions each year.

The United Nations said that while adult infection rates had dropped in some countries due to increased use of condoms and changes in sexual behavior, the epidemic continued to grow.

"The lessons of nearly 25 years into the AIDS epidemic are clear. Investments made in HIV prevention break the cycle of new infections. By making these investments, each and every country can reverse the spread of AIDS," Piot said.

Some Asian countries marked the day by handing out free condoms and holding flag-festooned rallies to promote awareness.

In Africa rage and remorse combined as the continent worst hit by the global crisis remembered its dead.

"Money earmarked for HIV/AIDS has gone into everything else but AIDS," fumed Meris Kafusi, a 64-year-old AIDS patient in Tanzania who only recently began receiving life-prolonging antiretroviral (ARV) drugs that are widespread in the West.

"Organizations that say they are dealing with AIDS are always in seminars or workshops. They should be buying food for widows and orphans ... Is this fair?"

Sub-Saharan Africa remains the worst place for worldwide HIV/AIDS deaths as well as for new infections -- cutting life expectancy in many countries, leaving millions of children orphaned and reducing agricultural output.

The latest U.N. estimates say 26 million of the 40 million people infected with HIV worldwide live in Africa.

President George W. Bush said U.S. efforts were helping 400,000 people get treatment in African countries such as Uganda and Kenya -- up from 50,000 two years ago.

"These countries, and many others, are fighting for the lives of their citizens, and America is now their strongest partner in that fight," he said.

In 2003 Bush pledged $15 billion over five years to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean. But critics including senior U.N. officials say his emphasis on abstinence-only programs has hobbled efforts by playing down the role of condoms.

The Roman Catholic Church's ban on condoms, fiercely attacked by many health workers, went unmentioned when Pope Benedict said abstinence and marital fidelity were helping combat the spread of HIV/AIDS in parts of Africa.

In France, President Jacques Chirac said schools should be equipped with condom vending machines and youths should be able to buy a condom for 20 cents.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called on his people to shed their inhibitions and start talking openly about safe sex.

"This, quite obviously, has to change if we are to succeed in creating awareness of the hazards of unsafe sexual practices," he told a gathering of young politicians.

India says it has 5.13 million people with HIV/AIDS, the second largest number after South Africa.

China's government, worried that the spread of AIDS could damage economic development, was due to launch an awareness campaign to educate millions of migrant workers -- farmers who flock to cities in search of higher-paying jobs.

Health Minister Gao Qiang said on Wednesday China aimed to keep the number of people infected by HIV virus to below 1.5 million by 2010, a forecast sharply lower than the World Health Organization (WHO) estimate of 10 million if nothing is done.

The WHO's chief China representative, Henk Bekedam, said China had made some making progress in slowing the rise in infection rates.

"What we have seen over the past three years is that China has taken action, and we do believe that this is now an old figure," he said, referring to the 10 million figure.

Estimates of AIDS in China, which was long secretive about the disease, are clouded by uncertainty and controversy.

But the anti-AIDS message is still falling on deaf ears in some parts of the world.

Health workers in red caps and blue jackets with the words "Stop AIDS" on the back stood in front of Tokyo's Shibuya station handing out packages containing condoms, information about AIDS testing and red plastic bracelets.

But when a health worker approached one group of high school boys, they laughed in an embarrassed way and waved her away.

Bush claims progress against AIDS in Africa

Thu Dec 1, 2005 12:24 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush claimed progress on Thursday in the battle against AIDS in Africa, saying U.S. efforts were helping 400,000 people in sub-Saharan Africa get treatment.

Bush said the U.S.-backed Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief was helping provide medical treatment in Uganda, Kenya, Botswana and Namibia.

"These countries, and many others, are fighting for the lives of their citizens, and America is now their strongest partner in that fight," he said at an event marking World AIDS Day.

The 400,000 figure, said Bush, was up from 50,000 getting treatment two years ago.

Sub-Saharan Africa remains hardest hit. The region has just over 10 percent of the world's population, but more than 60 percent of all people infected with HIV.

A lobby group called Africa Action complained that treatment was not being delivered quickly or broadly enough to save millions of lives in Africa and targeted pharmaceutical companies.

"In Africa, where more than 25 million people are living with HIV/AIDS, access to anti-retroviral treatment is a matter of life and death," said Salih Booker, Africa Action's executive director.

"But the prices charged by pharmaceutical companies, and the policies pursued by rich countries at their behest, continue to keep life-saving treatment out of reach for those most affected by HIV/AIDS," Booker said.

Bush promised in 2003 the United States would provide $15 billion over five years to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean. AIDS groups complain that less than half the money has been appropriated so far, while the White House said the program is on track.

Bush announced what he called a New Partners Initiative aimed at getting faith-based and community organizations that provide health care in the developing world to try to reach more afflicted people with care.

Condoms and rallies promote World AIDS Day

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Asia marked World AIDS Day on Thursday with free condoms, mobile phone games and flag-festooned rallies aimed at promoting awareness of a disease that kills millions in rich and poor countries each year.

The United Nations launched the annual event on Thursday by calling for an "exceptional response" to the threat and said that while adult infection rates had dropped in some countries due to increased use of condoms and changes in sexual behavior, the epidemic continued to grow.

The number of people living in 2005 with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, had reached its highest level ever at an estimated 40.3 million people, UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot said in a message to mark the occasion. Nearly half of them are women.

In Cambodia, where AIDS has killed 100,000 people and left 70,000 orphans, thousands of people gathered in the capital Phnom Penh to mark the day, many waving flags with safe sex messages.

The impoverished country has managed to slow its adult infection rate, but authorities say a conservative Buddhist culture has contributed to the spread of the disease.

"Because of our culture our women are facing barriers to telling their husbands to use condoms," said Dr Teng Kunthy, Deputy Secretary General of the National AIDS Authority.

In India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was to join student volunteers and ballet dancers to promote AIDS awareness a day after his health minister said many people in large and populous states were being missed out in AIDS counts.

There are 5.13 million people HIV-positive people in India, second only to South Africa which has the world's greatest number of cases.

A private Indian corporate chain operating diagnostic centers launched a premarital HIV check up on World AIDS day, saying increasing singles having sex in cities resulted in the demand for the service.

"In India, premarital sex is rising. It is not enough anymore to match horoscopes like we traditionally do in India before marriage," said Ameera Shah, vice president of Business Development of Metropolis Heath Services which has over 200 franchisees in India and abroad.

China's government, worried that the spread of AIDS could damage the country's economic development, was due to launch an AIDS awareness campaign to educate millions of migrant workers -- farmers who flock to cities in search of higher-paying jobs.

Health Minister Gao Qiang said on Wednesday that China aimed to keep the number of people infected by the HIV virus to below 1.5 million by 2010, a forecast sharply lower than the World Health Organization estimate of 10 million if nothing is done.

The official number of confirmed HIV cases in China was 135,630 at the end of September, a rise of 52 percent over a year before, but poor monitoring and official obstruction obscures the true scale of the epidemic, top AIDS official Wang Longde has said.

Health workers in red caps and blue jackets with the words "Stop AIDS" on the back stood in front of Tokyo's Shibuya station conducting surveys about AIDS and handing out packages containing condoms, information about AIDS testing and red plastic bracelets.

The square in front of the station was packed with young people and high school students on their way home from school. When a health worker approached one group of high school boys, all dressed in black school uniforms, they laughed in an embarrassed way and waved her away.

Japan may be one of the world's most advanced nations, but it also a country where AIDS cases have not dropped dramatically. Some experts say that cumulative numbers could jump to 50,000 by 2010 due to increased sexual activity among teenagers.

Nearly half of all 17-year-old girls have had sex, up from around 17 percent in 1990. For boys, the figure is 40 percent, nearly double the 1990 figure, health ministry data shows. In Vietnam, the Communist Party issued a directive calling on authorities to crack down harder on drug abuse and prostitution and educate young people about "healthy lifestyles".

Australia said it would donate A$10 million over five years to help fight HIV/AIDS in India and urged people to remain focused on the disease.

(With contributions from Kamil Zaheer in NEW DELHI, Michelle Nichols in CANBERRA, Elaine Lies in TOKYO, Vivi Lin and Benjamin Kang Lim in BEIJING, Ek Madra in PHNOM PENH and Nguyen Nhat Lam in HANOI)

Brazil bucks AIDS trend, but blacks are hard-hit

The federal government's AIDS program, which distributes condoms and anti-retroviral drugs, helped lower cases among critical groups such as teenagers, young women and children, the health ministry said.

Brazil, Latin's America's most populous country, also cut the rate of AIDS transmission through intravenous drug use with free syringes and publicity campaigns.

Overall, the number of new AIDS cases fell to 30,886 in 2004 from 33,904 in 2003. Brazilians with the virus fell to 17.2 per 100,000 people from 19.2 in 2003, the ministry said.

However, it said that between 2000 and 2004 new cases of AIDS among people who declared themselves black or brown rose from 33.4 percent of the total to 37.2 percent for men and from 35.6 percent to 42.4 percent for women.

"It's clear racism is an additional factor making people vulnerable," said Pedro Chequer, who heads the government program. "When a poor white and a poor black go into the public health system, the poor white gets treated better."

Around 47 percent of Brazil's 185 million people are black. Half of them live in poverty, according to government figures, and they are twice as likely as whites to be poor, receive less schooling and are more likely to die younger.

Blacks are nearly twice as likely as whites not to know how HIV is transmitted or not know how to protect themselves from the virus, a government study showed.

The ministry is set to launch a "Aids is Racism" campaign which will encourage blacks to seek information on HIV/AIDS.

Chequer said the country would also buy a record one billion condoms in 2006 and begin production at what he believed would be the world's first state-run condom factory.

Worldwide, HIV infections increased by nearly three million people between 2002 and 2004 and hit a record five million new cases in 2005, according to the United Nations body UNAIDS.

Brazil has defied 1990s forecasts the AIDS epidemic would ravage its young, sexually active population.

Begun in 1997, its free universal access to AIDS drugs has become a U.N.-recommended model for the developing world.

Pope avoids condom issue in AIDS message

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict said on Wednesday he felt close to victims of AIDS and encouraged efforts to find a cure for the killer disease but avoided the thorny issue of the Roman Catholic Church's ban on condoms.

"I feel close to those sick with AIDS and their families and I invoke for them the help and comfort of the Lord," he said in his comment for Thursday's World AIDS Day.

However, the Pope sidestepped the Church's general position against condoms to stop the spread of AIDS, a highly controversial stand which has drawn criticism from health workers both inside and outside the Church.

This appeared to be a continuation of a policy adopted in the final months of the reign of his predecessor John Paul in order not to provoke more criticism rather than any indication of an impending change in the regulation.

According to U.N. figures, nearly 5 million people were infected by HIV globally in 2005. Some 40.3 million people are living with the virus.

In his comments to pilgrims and tourists in St Peter's Square, the Pope said AIDS statistics were "alarming" and praised those in the Church working with AIDS sufferers.

"I encourage the many initiatives being promoted to eliminate this disease," he said.

The Church, which runs many hospitals and institutions to help AIDS victims, opposes the use of condoms except in the rarest of circumstances because they are a form of contraception.

It teaches that fidelity within heterosexual marriage, chastity and abstinence are the best ways to stop the spread of

One exception sometimes cited by Church experts as an example is that of allowing the use of condoms in the case where a man with HIV/AIDS insists on having sex with his wife.

The Church says promoting condoms to fight the spread of AIDS fosters what it sees as immoral and hedonistic lifestyles and behavior that will only contribute to its spread.

In its message for World AIDS Day, the Vatican department on health issues said the spread of the disease was made worse by the "pansexual culture that devalues sexuality, reducing it to a mere pleasure without further significance".

Last year, the Vatican set up a new foundation called Good Samaritan to coordinate funds from charities and organizations helping AIDS victims, particularly in Africa.

France concerned over rise in HIV infection

Sat Nov 26, 5:34 PM ET

The French government expressed concern over a 16 percent rise in the HIV transmission rate in the country, with 7,000 people infected with the deadly virus last year, according to figures released.

"I am worried. Worried about the increasing transmission, worried about the decrease and even the absence of preventative behaviour," said French Health Minister Xavier Bertrand said.

"One person in two who are infected with the virus are not aware" that they are HIV positive said the minister, adding that the number of people having unprotected sex had doubled in 10 years.

According to the French health monitoring institute InVS, some 7,000 people contracted the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) in 2004 compared to 6,000 in 2003, when reporting new cases became mandatory.

Some 1,500 HIV-infected people developed last year the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), the potentially fatal stage of the infection which attacks the immune system.

There are 150,000 people with HIV living in France.

The group most affected by HIV infection are people from sub-Saharan Africa at 32 percent of new HIV cases in 2004, the majority by heterosexual sex and two-thirds of them women. Twenty-four percent of new cases were among homosexual men.

The InVS said the number of people of French nationality infected by heterosexual sex was 17 percent in 2004.

WHO says AIDS may infect 10 mln in China by 2010