Social media said to deter AIDS prevention

State Council plan says health workers face challenges in reaching vulnerable populations

Wider use of social media, especially networking and dating tools for the gay community, has made controlling HIV/AIDS in China more difficult, according to a new government document.

While China is a low-prevalence country for HIV/AIDS, the country faces a “steep challenge” in controlling the spread of the virus, according to the State Council’s plan for prevention and treatment from 2016 to 2020, released on Sunday.

While the spread of HIV continues to pick up rapidly among gay men, greater use of social media has made it more challenging to reach them for intervention regarding high-risk behavior, the plan said.

Experts said that previously, it was easier for health workers to reach this population at gathering places like bars for discussions about safe sex practices and other related health issues. Now, such meeting places are often replaced by social sites.

Wu Hao, director of the infectious diseases department at Beijing’s You’an Hospital, said almost all gay men diagnosed with HIV or AIDS at his clinic said they had used social networking tools.

Of the more than 3,000 new HIV cases reported in the capital last year, a great majority are gay men, he said.

“Such tools pose a new challenge for intervention, since health workers find it difficult to reach them for education about safe sex and HIV prevention,” he said. “But it’s too simple to blame or even ban the sites,” Wu said, since networking technology will continue to evolve.

Liu Shi, a gay man and an AIDS patient in Beijing, agreed. He said, “A lack of knowledge, rather than the social media, is the culprit for HIV spreading among gay and straight people alike.”

But he recognized their wide use. “Such tools are almost a must for homosexuals as they help us find the group where we belong,” Liu said, adding that the most popular gay dating apps right now are Blued, a Chinese service, and overseas-based services like Grinder and Jack’d.

“I hope they will become more socially responsible and deliver more AIDS intervention efforts among the users to safeguard their health,” he said.

Geng Le, CEO of Blued, which claims 21 million registered users in China, said, “We will definitely do more to promote AIDS controls, but please, don’ t stigmatize social media and new technology.”

Health authorities also have enlisted emerging social media to fight HIV and AIDS.

Wu Zunyou, director of the National Center for AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Disease Control and Prevention, said, “They have been invited to play a bigger role in better reaching the susceptible groups for prevention education.”

Geng said Blued has launched services like free HIV testing and counseling for users in partnership with health officials. They’ve introduced alerts, in which messages on HIV/AIDS risks and prevention are sent to users automatically when key words like “meet up”, “dating” and “sex” are detected, he said.

But Liu urged more systematic and detailed education via social media. “We need details like how to use condoms or lubricant properly, not just vague alerts,” he said.

China has an estimated 650,000 people living with HIV or AIDS. “Key populations” for intervention include gay men, migrant workers, students and people seeking jobs overseas, the State Council plan says. It also sets goals for detection and treatment: By 2020, 90 percent of the people with HIV or AIDS should be detected and 90 percent of those diagnosed should be receiving treatment.

The State Council, or the Cabinet, released its fourth five-year national action plan for HIV/ AIDS prevention and treatment on Sunday, outlining the challenges the country faces in the fight against this deadly disease and providing guidelines for targeted actions at both official and grassroots levels. While the national prevalence of HIV is low, at 0.06 percent according to the World Health Organization, it is concentrated in specific areas and populations.

Among the worsening problems is the increasing number of sexually transmitted infections in men as a result of male-tomale sexual transmission, and the fast-increasing rate of infections among young people. The infection rate among 15- to 24year-olds increased 13 percent a year on average from 2011 to 2015, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Another worry is the number of people who are not aware of their HIV status, which is estimated at about 32 percent of the total number of people living with HIV, which makes it difficult to provide effective prevention and treatment services and increases the risk of further transmission of the virus.

To tackle these problems head-on, the action plan sets several specific targets, such as increasing HIV/AIDS prevention awareness to over 85 percent of residents and using education to reduce AIDS-related homosexual behavior by at least 10 percent by 2020.

Related departments are required to promote targeted education to increase public awareness of the disease among key groups, such as the migrant population, teenagers, the elderly, overseas workers and people in detention.

Efforts are also called for to crack down on illegal activities that are closely related to the transmission of the virus, including prostitution, drug abuse and drug trafficking.

However, for these initiatives to achieve their purpose requires better coordination among the different government departments.

For instance, the action plan rightly promotes the use of condoms, a proven effective way to prevent the transmission of the virus and other sexually transmitted diseases. Yet there is still no easy access to condoms at public places in many parts of the country or their use is often ignored.

Also, while raising awareness of the disease, more needs to be done to tackle the discrimination against those infected with the disease, as this stops many from getting tested for the virus.

The fight against HIV/AIDS remains complex and dynamic, and to succeed requires leadership to coordinate the necessary efforts of government and society. The action plan provides a blueprint that can be translated into real progress.