Taiwan’s Lack of WHO Observer Status Restricts Access to AIDS Resources, Washington Post Columnist Says

In a column titled "Diplomatic Dispatches," Nora Boustany of the Washington Post writes that Taiwan's uncertain global status in relation to China denies the population "adequate access" to "essential resources in battling the AIDS pandemic" from world health programs. Taiwan's five attempts to join the WHO's assembly with observer status have all been denied, most recently in May. China "successfully campaigned" to diminish the global status of Taiwan, which is recognized as a national entity by 28 countries and considered as a "self-governing" island included in China's territory by others. AIDS cases in Taiwan have grown from "a scattered few" to 4,000, and Boustany says that Lee Ming Liang, Taiwan's U.S.-trained director general of health, wants to "prevent this from picking up momentum." Liang said that "health should be divorced from politics" and that unless Taiwan continues to seek entry into health organizations "nobody thinks of us -- as if we are nonexistent" (Boustany, Washington Post, 8/1).