Chen Juemin, director-general of the Yunnan Provincial Bureau of Health in Kunming, told me that his province would not offer anti-HIV drugs until they had the ability to test people's CD4 white blood cells and the amount of virus in their blood. These monitoring tests remain too expensive for most Asian countries--and China's central government does not plan to offer them in its new countrywide program. Yunnan is charting its own course. "We're going to do antiviral treatment according to international standards," said Chen. "I'm not going to blindly pursue the number of people we're going to treat. I'm only going to pursue the best results for the people we provide treatment." |
