Chicago Health Center Employees Travel to China to Give Advice on Halting Spread of HIV/AIDS
A group of Chicago HIV/AIDS experts recently visited Hangzhou, China, to give officials there advice on how to curb the spread of HIV, the Chicago Tribune reports in a feature about their trip. A delegation from Chicago's Howard Brown Health Center, a gay- and lesbian-focused health organization, met with officials from the Zhejiang Provincial Health Bureau and said that "get[ting] the Chinese to overcome their political and cultural squeamishness" about how HIV is spread was their biggest challenge during the visit. One Chinese official "insisted" that Hangzhou, which has 1.7 million residents, could not have more than 20 gay men. The concept of an organization that focuses exclusively on homosexuals is "unheard of" in China, according to the Tribune. According to Keith Waterbrook, medical administrator and leader of the Chicago delegation, three or four Chinese health officials plan to travel to Chicago to observe the center's work with gay men and lesbians (Lev, Chicago Tribune, 10/3).
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