ILO Launches Report on Discrimination against People with HIV within Healthcare Settings in China

• Author: ILO

Beijing, 17 May 2011 - The International Labour Office (ILO) for China and Mongolia has released today a report about discrimination faced by people with HIV when accessing medical services in China.

Research for the report, Discrimination against People Living with HIV within Healthcare Settings in China, was jointly carried out by the ILO and the National Center for STD and AIDS Prevention and Control (NCAIDS). It draws upon interviews with 103 people living with HIV (PLHIV), and 23 hospital managers, healthcare workers and health administrators, and provides insight into HIV-related discrimination in hospitals and clinics. The issues faced by individuals include difficulty in accessing medical services and discriminatory treatment by healthcare workers as well as denial of surgery and other forms of care.

A 37-year-old HIV positive man from Shaanxi Province told the researchers what happened when he found a lump in his stomach. “Each hospital advised that I should be hospitalized immediately for surgery, but when they heard that I was HIV positive, none were willing to accept me. They asked me to go to the infectious disease hospital…” he said. “The hospital did not agree to let me use the operating theatre. They said if other patients knew that an HIV person had used the operating theatre, it would badly influence the...