AIDS-Related Illnesses Ranked Third in Infectious Disease Deaths in China in 2005, Health Ministry Says

AIDS-related illnesses surpassed hepatitis B as China's third deadliest infectious disease in 2005, the country's Ministry of Health said Monday, Xinhua/China Daily reports. Tuberculosis was the country's deadliest infectious disease, followed by rabies, AIDS and hepatitis B, according to the ministry. TB, hepatitis B, dysentery, gonorrhea and syphilis were the five most prevalent infectious diseases in China in 2005. The health ministry reported that 13,263 people died due to infectious disease in the nation in 2005, an increase of nearly 82% from 2004 (Xinhua/China Daily, 2/14). Those figures conflict with a report released last month by the ministry, the World Health Organization and UNAIDS that reported about 25,000 AIDS-related deaths in China in 2005, the AP/Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports. The ministry said there were 4.42 million cases of infectious disease reported in 2005, but it did not give a breakdown of how many people died of each disease (Visser, AP/Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 2/13).