Pregnant women in Shenzhen, one of China's five special economic zones, may soon have to take an AIDS test when they go through health checkups during pregnancy.

Zhou Jun'an, head of Shenzhen Health Bureau, made the request at the second council meeting of Shenzhen Preventive Medicine Society held recently.

Zhou said that the move is designed to intensify the efforts to prevent the spread of AIDS in the city, especially the spreading of the disease by mothers to their infants. He explained that 84.4 percent of the HIV-positive patients found in the city are transient people, and female HIV-positive patients make up a comparatively bigger proportion of the group. Two pregnant HIV-positive patients were found when local medical organizations carried out health checkups on pregnant women last year.

The number of HIV-positive carriers and AIDS patients has been rising at an alarming speed in China in the past years. Last year alone, the national growth rate was 30 percent, which has made the prevention of AIDS in the country an urgent task

(Xinhua 03/24/2001)