You're in: AIDS at 25 Coverage / Seed Interview: Wan Yanhai
Fake blood covers the plaque of the Chinese embassy in Paris Fri., Sept. 13, 2002, after a protest by Act Up militants against the imprisonment of Chinese AIDS activist Wan Yanhai. Credit: AP Photo/Francois Mori
From the JAN/FEB 2003 issue of Seed:
Late at night on August 24, 2002, Wan Yanhai, China's most important AIDS activist, was heading home when his taxi was stopped and surrounded by several unmarked sedans. Wan was ordered out of the taxi by four plainclothes men and hustled into the lead car. Wan recalled three months later, "I thought somebody might kill me."
He spent 27 days incommunicado in a Beijing detention center. Since his release, Wan has resumed his work fighting for the rights of AIDS victims, curbing widespread ignorance about HIV, and pushing the Chinese government to acknowledge the disease. I met him in early November outside Washington, D.C. for his first sit-down interview since his release. In fluent English, he talked about his arrest and his time in prison, the climate of fear surrounding his work, and China's response to an epidemic that he estimates might already be the largest in the world.
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When did you first hear the word AIDS?
In 1983, in medical school.
What made you decide that this was an important enough problem to dedicate your life to?
There was no one incident. While I was in medical school, I had a chance to read World Health Organization documents on AIDS that talked about AIDS and human rights. I began to question the strategy of the Chinese government.
What was the strategy?
AIDS became an ideological weapon to attack Western culture. The media didn't talk much about AIDS in the 1980s—at least not AIDS in China. There was no limit to talking about AIDS internationally, but the media kept silent on AIDS domestically.
"All of a sudden, a car pulled in front of us. Four men got out and asked to see my ID. When I showed it to them, they told me to come with them. They took my cell phone and glasses. They were not wearing uniforms."
In 1985, when China found its first AIDS patient, officials in the Ministry of Health announced that AIDS would not spread in China, because we had a strong tradition of morality—no homosexuality, no drug users—and a good health care system. The government's strategy was to prevent the virus from entering the country. It stopped importing blood products, and began screening people from overseas. China set up a Great Wall. Unfortunately, domestic blood was not tested, and law did not protect the rights of patients.
I felt that you have to face the reality of an open society. To travel from Washington to Beijing is no different than from Beijing to Shanghai. This is an infectious disease. Can you just close the door?
Did your experiences growing up lead you to question authority?
My parents were old Communist Party members who fought in the civil war. My father really believed in Communism and he tried his best to follow its teachings and follow party leaders. I grew up in the Cultural Revolution, and that's when I started to think about issues and question issues.
The Cultural Revolution made you question issues?
Well, the general environment was not exactly supportive of questioning. It was the changes the society went through afterwards. During the Cultural Revolution, I saw my father and my mother standing on the street, wearing signs that said "counterrevolutionary." Mobs of people would attack them. My father was beaten so badly that he couldn't walk for a long time.