China’s Conscience

Passionate pioneer Dr. Wan Yanhai levels with A&U’s Dann Dulin about the outlook of AIDS in China, his personal mission, and the price for speaking out

“A few days ago a leading AIDS activist in China disappeared. In many countries, such an event might prompt worries about the activist’s health or fears of foul play. In China, the assumption is that Wan Yanhai has been put in prison for being too truthful about the AIDS catastrophe facing the country. Nor does it surprise anyone that police might spirit Dr. Wan off to jail without bothering to let anyone know….”

—The Washington Post, September 2, 2002

Indeed, Dr. Wan Yanhai spent a month in jail. This brave whistle-blower helped expose a scheme by local officials in rural Henan Province to sell blood known to be possibly tainted. Up to one million people were infected with HIV in the province alone, and on his Web site, Wan named the Henan officials who were responsible. Shortly thereafter, the Web site attracted the interest of the Central Chinese government.

On the night of his arrest, Wan had attended a film screening and was on his way home when he noticed that his chuzu qiche (taxi) was being followed by several vehicles. “I was afraid I might be killed by somebody,” he said. “I feared they might be criminals, or the police from Henan Province, which, to me, meant the same as criminals.” When the cab arrived at his Beijing home, it was surrounded by the vehicles. He noticed they were from the Beijing Municipal State Security, and felt relieved because he believed that he had not committed any crime. As soon as he climbed out of the cab, several men came toward him and ushered him into their car. Later, he was arrested for revealing “state secrets.”

At the time, the Chinese government was in denial, and sought to keep a lid on the epidemic in the country. As soon as Wan was released, he worked diligently to get the Chinese government to approve the legal status of his AIDS organization, AIZHI Institute of Health Education, which he founded in 1994. They finally did. After prison, Wan released this statement about his captors: “Their position is that AIDS is a problem for the government and the experts to solve, not for regular people or grass-roots organizations.” Wan has never discussed what went on in prison until now.

Presently, on this hot, humid afternoon in Beijing, Wan, forty-two, sits at his cherry wood desk doing ten things at once.  His well-worked-in office is simple and, except for his fire-engine red phone, stark white. It is located within the AIZHI Institute of Health Education. AIZHI is an acronym for love, knowledge, and action. Wan’s journey into the epidemic began fifteen years ago. In 1992, he founded the first AIDS hotline in China. In 2000, Wan translated and published HIV/AIDS Lawmakers Handbook and Suggestions

for Legislation on HIV/AIDS, and, from 2001 to 2002, he was a Fulbright New Century Scholar.

Numerous awards and degrees cover Wan’s sterile office walls. He proudly points out the 2002 International Recipient of Awards for Action on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights by Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and Human Rights Watch.  He was also bestowed the Defenders' Award by the International League for Human Rights. He has spent time in America -- his wife of seven years is currently a student here – as a visiting scholar at the University of Southern California and California State University Northridge.  While in the United States, Dr. Wan worked with clinics and community centers.

Despite his small stature, Wan has a large presence. Almost cat-like, he’s shy and soft-spoken, but, when roused, he’s like a coiled spring that snaps. When he perceived his government to be unfair, he attacked. Some consider him a hero but, for him, this word isn’t even in his vocabulary. Wan shuns the spotlight, and is more of a get-your-hands-dirty, dig-in-the-mud kind of man. The doctor is unassuming, forthright, and outspoken, and he momentarily revels in the satisfaction of yet another successful conference over the past five days. He’s a bit strained from all the toil. The theme of the many sexual-minority workshops was human rights. They consisted of: Law, Human Rights, and HIV/; Lesbian Activism; Gay and Lesbian Websites; Gay Community Establishment; Treatment Education; and Sexual Minorities, Health and Rights. This was the first international conference sponsored and organized by AIZHI. Groups from various Chinese provinces and Hong Kong attended, along with organizations from Australia, Canada, the United States, and Taiwan. 

“It is my duty to take responsibility for these minorities,” he asserts with understated fervor. Because prejudice against minorities in any society intensifies the effort to battle HIV/AIDS, Wan is first and foremost concerned with helping China’s sexual minorities, as well as sex workers and intravenous drug users. This is his mission.

But where was this commitment born? “I attended Shanghai Medical University and I did the AIDS walk when I was a student there,” Wan says, momentarily looking at the baseball-size glass globe on his desk. “I read about AIDS in the newspaper, then I got to know some HIV people. In 1990, I became involved in HIV/AIDS education and research when I was working at the China National Health Education Institute.” It was here that he set up an AIDS hotline for the general public, and organized community outreach education for gay and bisexual males in Beijing. He was later fired from this job for promoting AIDS awareness.

Wan excuses himself as he exits his office to conduct some business in an adjoining room. He appears to be preoccupied with many thoughts at once. It often takes a while to get a direct answer from him, as he tries to express his thoughts in English.

Wan’s most powerful mouthpiece is his organization, AIZHI, which has coordinated efforts to assist AIDS orphans in Henan Province, among its many accomplishments. The organization’s Web site has informed and influenced the work of the U.N. and other international groups, and they continue to overcome governmental regulations and attempts by local authorities to cover up AIDS in rural areas. Even though AIZHI has been officially designated as an NGO, Wan doesn’t believe the government has fully accepted the organization. “It takes time,” he reasons, now sitting back at his desk. “The government is a big system, and, also, we are complicated ourselves. We do have to work together, though sometimes we disagree with each other. That’s our society, and that’s your society. My colleagues and I have tried to make a difference but it’s still too early to say. I’m happy that we can contribute in this critical time and have pushed the government to change their policy and take action,” he says modestly, coughing then clearing his throat. 

AIZHI continues to focus on migrants and the gay community to provide education, treatment and health rights workshops, and push for community global funds. They financially support fellow community organizations around China, and it’s a daily effort to keep these up and running. “We are like a watch dog over the community,” he boasts like a proud father, “and we hope to continue to make some good change in both government and community levels.” In the coming months AIZHI will brainstorm how to assist more HIV victims of tainted blood transfusions, including hemophiliacs, and launch a national council so as to make the government face the problem and provide a solution and compensation. 

The Chinese government recently launched needle exchange programs and prevention initiatives in areas where HIV is prevalent. According to a 2003 study, the highest HIV transmission is through injected drug use of contaminated needles (44%), blood/plasma donation (24%), heterosexual (20%),  gay sex (11%), and other (1%).  Since China has been slow to respond to their AIDS epidemic (statistics point to over a million who are presently infected), could China be next on the list of global devastation?  Wan takes a deep breath before he answers.  “Maybe not, but it could. In some Provinces we do find a serious epidemic, especially in Central and Western part of China where people are injecting drugs, and in Central, where the virus has been passed through blood transfusions. And we don’t know yet the impact of the epidemic on sex workers. There is a lot of uncertainty and we are trying to get more data.”

“Thankfully, Chinese society is responding to the AIDS crisis. That’s good,” he sighs then is quick to add, “There’s still much to learn. There needs to be more debate, more scientific research, and more community social movement. It’s difficult for our government, but they are willing to listen now. There will be more interactions between community-based campaigns and the social democracy. If China wants to win this battle, they will have to be more transparent and more democratic. This virus is more dangerous than the Chinese police,” he insists.

When I continue with this subject, Wan’s body tightens. It is visibly painful for him to talk about his conviction. “It was really, really difficult,” Wan says, fidgeting. “I feared I might never get out.” In Chinese, he yells to a worker in the next office. A young woman enters and they have a brief exchange. She exits, Wan apologizes for the interruption, and continues. “Yes, it was difficult. Very difficult. They tortured me.” There is a profound silence. “They physically tortured me,” admits Wan delicately. I confess that I didn’t know. Wan chuckles and confirms, “Nobody knows that.” He slouches back in his office chair and gazes at the bookcase. He questions whether he wants to retract what he has just said, but, he reasons that three years have passed and “it’s okay now.” 

I press Wan for more, but it’s obviously grueling for him to confront his past. I inquire about his captors’ torture methods.  “My leg and foot are still not comfortable sometimes,” he says matter-of-factly, looking down, reluctant to reveal more. “It’s not easy to say. They tortured me three times while I was there. Three times. Three times,” he repeats with horror. “It was a long, ah, ah.…It’s difficult to say.” He chokes up. His face is filled with anguish. Wan waves his arm and turns his head to the side dismissing any more questions. Throughout this confession, Wan has been slowly trying to open a letter that was on his desk. He places the letter atop a stack of other letters, and softly says, “Psychologically, it’s not easy.” Wan leans in toward me, arms folded and resignedly concludes, “Though I don’t know what else I would do if I couldn’t help others with AIDS.”

HIV/AIDS AND CHINA

(Some information below was gathered from the AIZHI Institute of

Health Education workshops in Beijing, June 2005)

• There is fear of HIV testing because it is believed that patient confidentiality will not be protected, despite the existence of privacy rules.

• The AIDS epidemic now is similar to the way it was in the US in the early to mid-eighties.

• A drug user cannot receive methadone unless he/she has failed other methods first. This makes people go through horrible processes.

• There is a high mobility of sex and migrant workers spreading HIV throughout the country.

• 40-50% of HIV infection is from drug use (contaminated needles); a third of HIV infection is transmitted by gay sex.

• TV commercials about AIDS prevention are currently running on television, and newspapers and magazines are beginning to follow suit.

• There are 300-500 hundred million gay and lesbians, and the majority of them have unprotected sex.

• Infection with the HIV virus is considered immoral by many.

• There could be 10 million HIV infections in China by 2010.

• The health care system is poor, and anti-viral medication is very expensive, thus HIV goes untreated.

• Many people who start cocktail treatment start and stop, which not only renders the drugs ineffective, could also cause mutation of new strains of the virus.
  
• Condom advertising was banned until 2002

• Though extremely politicized, there are now over 100 NGO’s, double the number that existed just one year ago. Three years ago, there was only one NGO.  However, not many are officially registered and recognized by the Chinese Government.

Contact Dr. Wan Yanhai at AIZHI Institute of Health Education, Room 171/A, Feng Yu Office Building, #115 Fucheng Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100036, China. Contact him by e-mail at hiwan@aizhi.org.

For Chinese-speaking LGBT readers, log on to www.ICCGL.info and www.gaychinese.net to keep up-to-date.

Many thanks to Joanne Csete, Scott Burris, Lori Stoltz, and Damien Lu.

Dann Dulin is Senior Editor of A&U.

February 2006