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Abstract
The efforts of Wan and others have stunned an authoritarian government out of a decade-long state of denial. Authorities have announced free HIV tests, needle-exchange programmes, condom promotions, and subsidised treatment for the poor. Wan told The Lancet that while he applauds these changes, he doubts about whether the new policy can be implemented, given the problems of the health system and the lack of reliable data. He poured scorn on the government's estimate of 840 000 HIV cases in China. And he accused WHO of collusion in accepting the official estimate. "I just don't believe the government's figures. I have asked them why they believe there are 840 000 HIV cases and not 8-4 million, but I haven't got an answer", he said. Wan said the UN's record on HIV in China has been mixed. While praising the UN's Titanic Report-which gave a much higher estimate of HIV infections than the government was doing at the time-and recent efforts by WHO officials to encourage the authorities to be more open about the problem, he said the world body was also guilty of suppressing politically sensitive news about the Henan blood-selling scandal, which led to some of the highest concentrations of HIV infection rates in the world. "When we look at recent history, the UN has helped to cover up the AIDS scandal in China. That I cannot tolerate", he said. "They must have known about the blood scandal in the 1990s when the first reports were issued, but they took no action." The government and the UN are likely to dismiss Wan's own grim figures, but he has been proved right in the past in rejecting the officially rosy view of the HIV situation in China. So far, such prescience has not helped his career; his rewards have been demotions and arrest.