Chen Wei was shocked to learn of the AIDS situation in China at a lecture she attended in the Party School of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee.

"The figures presented at the lecture were alarming," said Chen, director of the Arbitration and Mediation Center for Personnel Disputes under the Ministry of Personnel.

The AIDS prevention lecture, a training program at the Central Party School, initiated and organized by Prof. Jin Wei, aimed to "influence those who have the power to influence others". It includes topics such as AIDS prevention knowledge and policies, the current situation, the relation between policymakers and the disease and response measures.

Under the direct leadership of the CPC Central Committee, the Party School of the CPC Central Committee is the highest institution for training high and middle-ranking party officials and Maxist theoreticians.

The party school's curriculum usually includes two parts, the traditional theories such as Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory and the "Three Represents", and important social issues such as the development of rural China, the right of farmers and the reform of state-owned enterprises.

Like Chen Wei, students who receive training courses at the central party school are usually high-ranking party officials or senior officials from provinces or municipalities.

"It is a moving moment to address current and future leaders of the country," said UNAIDS executive director Dr. Peter Piot in June last year, when he gave a lecture titled "AIDS -- One of the biggest challenges to society".

Since November 2001, the AIDS prevention training program has educated more than 3,000 party officials and expanded to 22 party schools of CPC provincial and municipal committees.

The number of people officially reported as HIV positive in China has risen by 27.5 percent so far this year to more than 180,000.

China has about 650,000 people living with HIV/AIDS including 75,000 who have developed AIDS.

Before the training program, a survey on AIDS knowledge was conducted among more than 3,000 party officials with a university education and mostly under 50 years old. The results were also "shocking".

More than 60 percent were unaware there are no existing AIDS vaccines and about 30 percent thought HIV carriers should be isolated for treatment.

In addition to ignorance, party officials at basic levels also expressed rejection and confusion when the program was carried outin local party schools.

"Does the party school doubt our behavior or are our moral ethics being questioned?" This was the question that 47 party officials had in mind on Oct. 12 when they were given a lecture on AIDS prevention in the Yi Autonomous Prefecture of Liangshan, southwest China's Sichuan province.

To their surprise, the lecturer was Kang Wanzhong, deputy principal of the party school, who usually teaches party theories. Some of the students had attended Kang's class on selected works of former President Jiang Zemin.

"The AIDS situation in the autonomous prefecture of Liangshan is very severe, with reported HIV/AIDS cases in 16 of the 17 counties and more than 2,000 tested HIV positive, accounting for half of the Sichuan province infections," Kang said.

Kang said local officials attached too little importance to AIDS prevention and invested to little in preventing the spread of AIDS.

"The lecture gave me a clear view of the global AIDS situation and the severe situation China is facing," Chen Wei said.

Others were also enlightened. According to Kang Wanzhong, the attitudes of local party officials had changed after they took the course.

Many county officials are promoting condom use, methadone treatment and clean needle exchanges, while before the lecture, they thought these measures were encouraging prostitution and drug use.

Jin Wei said the criticism of party officials for their ignorance of AIDS was unfair since the whole of society lacked adequate information on the disease and public health figures were not included in the assessment of officials.

Premier Wen Jiabao acknowledged that officials had ignored the importance of public health in the past at his meeting with Margaret Chan, the newly-elected World Health Organization chief.

"In the past, many of our officials only knew of GDP and not of the CDC [Centre for Disease Control and Prevention]. But actually the CDC has a closer relationship to the lives of the people," Wen said.

However, this thinking had changed after the SARS epidemic and Beijing had built a disease control network stretching from the central to the county level during the past three years, he said.

"We want to use the rich resources of the party school to prevent the spread of HIV," Li Junru, deputy principal of the central party school, said.

The key for AIDS prevention in China was leadership, the key for party school AIDS education was also leadership, said Jin Wei, adding that the support from principals of the central party school was indispensable for the program's development since any activity inside the central party school must first get the school leaders approval for it to proceed.

Many leaders in local party schools still find it hard to understand why it is necessary to give the AIDS lecture.

"We want to use the spread of AIDS to bring the attention of the policymakers and public servants to the important issue of public health, and teach them how to deal with such situations, so as to improve their governing capabilities," Jin said.

"I plan to invite experts to give lectures on AIDS after I finish my training here in the central party school in January so that my colleagues will spread the knowledge to their friends and their friends to friends," Chen Wei said.

Editor: Donald