The Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), Michel Sidibe, has said that China is one of the success stories during the past 15 years.
Sidibe said this during the Third International Conference on Financing for Development in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
He said “China has been one of our success stories during this past 15 years. I remember in those days, there was zero tolerance for people who were injecting drugs, sex workers, men having sex with men. And that was the main areas where we are having a growing infection.
“Today, China has completely changed the legislation in terms of fighting HIV/AIDS and has one of the largest programs helping drug users to have access to methadone.
“I am convinced that we are going to control the epidemic. It will not be a public health threat anymore because innovation, research, good-will of people.
“I am not saying that we will not have any case of HIV but their life expectancy will be the same as others and they will be able to live positively, continue to work, and not have children born with the virus.”
Sidibe urged China to share their knowledge with Africa. He said “China can also be transferring their knowledge on ‘bare- foot doctors’ to Africa because what we need is to invest on millions of community workers to be able to reach communities with knowledge so they can stop emerging epidemic.
“This is not just about AIDS. Look at the response to Ebola outbreak in West Africa. China is in the frontline but it will be good to train a lot of people in countries like Sierra Leon, so on community level they can be able to stop the diseases.”