Taiwan's efforts to assist in Malawi's AIDS prevention and control have been reported in the July issue of Bulletin, an international journal on public health published by the WHO, a health official said on Monday.
Peter Chang (張武修), director-general of the Bureau of International Cooperation under the Department of Health, said the report marked the first time that the WHO had recognized Taiwan's achievements in global health issues in an official publication since the country was forced out of the world health regulatory body in 1972.
Chang said Pingtung Christian Hospital had operated Taiwan's medical mission in Malawi, one of the country's African allies, since 2002. The team offers free medical treatment and free anti-retroviral drugs to HIV-infected patients at Malawian hospitals.
It has also mobilized medical professionals, volunteer workers and AIDS patients whose condition is under control to set up 66 clinics in that country -- providing care for more than 40,000 AIDS patients.
Chang said the Taiwan mission had initiated a new strategy to fight the AIDS epidemic in Malawi by having medical staff actively seek out patients in need of proper medical treatment.
The mission realized that waiting passively in the hospital for patients was not an effective way of carrying out AIDS prevention and control measures, he said.
The mission had also created electronic medical histories for AIDS patients, Chang said. Chang said the basic information management system, taken for granted in clinics and hospitals in Taiwan, was a new development in Malawi and the team had to overcome a lot of difficulties in establishing it.
In Malawi, the AIDS scourge has cut average life expectancy to only 40, despite great efforts in disease prevention and control. Though Taiwan has done much to combat the problem, bringing the disease under control remains a work in process, Chang said.
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