http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/08/23/national/CHINA23.htm
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Thursday,
August 23, 2001 |
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Hepatitis B plagues China
In one southern province, 75 pct. of the population has
had the disease. Dirty needles are blamed.
By Martin Fackler
ASSOCIATED
PRESS
SHANGHAI, China - The use of dirty needles in
injections and acupuncture has helped give the southern province of Guangdong
one of the highest rates of hepatitis B infection in the world, officials and
experts said yesterday.
Blood samples taken from patients during hospital visits indicate 10 million
people - 75 percent of the province's population - have had the potentially lethal
disease, said Luo Huiming, of the Guangdong Disease Control and Prevention
Center.
He said early surveys indicated that two-thirds of China's 1.26 billion
people had been infected. That compares with about one in 20 Americans.
As with AIDS, hepatitis B is spread by contact with infected blood or
through sex. But hepatitis B is easier to catch because it is 100 times more
concentrated in the blood and can survive briefly outside the human body.
Because of years of screening, most of China's blood supply is probably safe
from hepatitis B, said Liu Chongbo, a researcher at the China Academy of
Medical Prevention.
About 60 percent of those who have had the disease caught it during
childhood, usually during routine vaccinations. Mothers also infect their
children during birth or while breast-feeding, Liu said.
Most of those infected with hepatitis B survive. But in acute cases, the
virus attacks the liver, causing cirrhosis and cancer. These diseases kill
about 300,000 people in China each year, about 80 percent of whom had hepatitis
B, Liu said.
Experts also blamed an illegal trade in needles that have been inadequately
cleaned and repackaged. They also said there were increasing reports of infection
from acupuncture, a traditional Chinese remedy in which dozens of needles can
be stuck into the skin.
Effective vaccinations exist and are now required for children in the United
States. But at $25, they are too expensive for most Chinese and are not covered
by national health insurance.
Also yesterday, the official Xinhua News Agency issued a warning about the
spread of AIDS in China via tainted blood and unclean blood-collection methods.
"China has to learn lessons from other countries that have reported
many HIV/AIDS cases associated with blood transfusion, and must take determined
measures to ensure blood safety," Xinhua said.
China recently has admitted it has a tainted-blood problem, after years of trying to silence doctors and journalists who publicized high AIDS rates in rural villages. China says 600,000 people have contracted the AIDS virus, about 71 percent of them drug users who shared needles.
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