ZONE:

The Chinese government on Thursday reported a sharp increase in the number of Chinese infected with the AIDS virus.

Authorities have announced a 40% increase in the number of Chinese estimated to be infected with HIV, saying up to 850,000 people could be infected and 100,000 might have died from the disease, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

The previous official estimate was 600,000. The United Nations however estimates that the number of HIV-positive Chinese at more than 1.5 million.

The number of confirmed HIV infections was more than 17% above the figure announced in mid 2001. There are 30,736 people confirmed to be carrying the virus and 1,594 people with full-blown AIDS, though the true number of cases could be as high as 200,000.

The report noted that authorities believe China's official AIDS statistics are far lower than the true figure because of poor reporting by local health officials.

"Experts believe that over half of the 200,000 AIDS patients have lost their lives," the news agency said.

After years of denial, the Health Ministry finally broke its silence in August last year when they said the number of confirmed cases had jumped 67 percent in the first half of 2001. Authorities have reportedly detained reporters who tried to find information about the outbreak and harassed Chinese AIDS activists who tried to publicise it.