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Center Launched to Fight Diseases in China
A national disease prevention and control center will soon be established to enhance efforts to fight diseases.
The center will focus on conducting investigations, research and supervision of various diseases and public health problems, and suggesting corresponding prevention and control measures, sources with the Ministry of Health said yesterday.
The center will also provide a scientific basis for the ministry to make health policies, laws and regulations.
China's present epidemic and disease prevention system has lagged behind the development of various diseases and public health problems brought on by industrialization and the aging of the population, sources said.
The ministry has several separate disease prevention and control centers, such as the National Center for AIDS Prevention and Control, but it is hard for them to pool their efforts and to cover all fields.
Many difficulties in improving the country's health were the result of the shortage of advanced technologies in preventive medicine, adequate epidemic supervision and effective health education.
Now, AIDS, TB and other infectious diseases pose serious threats to public health, while more and more people continue to die from non-infectious diseases.
Experts estimate that China now has 600,000 HIV/AIDS victims, and the number is increasing by 30 per cent annually.
However, there is still no effective prevention and control system to fight the deadly disease.
Meanwhile, people lack knowledge of the cause, spread and development of endemic, vermin-caused and occupational diseases, as well as many other non-infectious diseases. This makes control work more difficult.
Official figures show that 90 per cent of people die from chronic and non-infectious diseases, such as tumours and blood diseases of the heart and brain.
At the same time, China is becoming an "aging society," with 10 per cent of its population over 60. This will also bring many public health problems which will need effective supervision and study.
The establishment of the center is expected to play a leading role in disease supervision, officials from the ministry said.
The center will also cover the hygienic supervision of food, workplaces, schools and other public places.
Prevention and control programmes against various diseases will be created by the center, which will also be in charge of evaluating the development of the programmes.
All nation's vaccination programmes will be carried out by the center and its branches, and all the biological products for prevention will be under the control and management of the center.
More health education and improvement work will also be done by the center.
Sources: China Daily
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