2023-12-12 06:43:00
Gao Yaojie, a gynecologist who became China’s most famous anti-AIDS activist before going into exile in the United States, died in New York at the age of 95, we learned from one of her relatives.
Dr. Gao moved to New York in 2009, after being harassed for years by Chinese authorities for denouncing the scale of the AIDS epidemic, linked to the blood trade, in Henan province (central ).
Dr Gao died at her American home on Sunday, Andrew Nathan, a prominent sinologist who managed her affairs in the United States, told AFP.
Gao Yaojie was one of the first doctors to hear about the mysterious illness that was killing villagers in the mid-1990s. She realized that many poor farmers had contracted the AIDS virus while selling their crops. blood during unhygienic collections approved by the authorities.
As local authorities tried to cover up the scandal, Gao Yaojie began purchasing medicine and basic supplies at his own expense to treat the sick.
Experts estimate that at least one million people in Henan province alone have contracted HIV through the blood trade.
Gao Yaojie had become one of the most active campaigners to raise awareness of the plight of AIDS patients in China and received international recognition for her work. Chinese authorities had refused to issue her a passport for years and had often placed her under surveillance.
China finally recognized the scale of the crisis in 2001, and even gave Dr. Gao an award three years later. But in 2007, the authorities placed her under temporary house arrest to prevent her from traveling to the United States to receive an award from Hillary Clinton, then a US senator.
Beijing ended up giving in and letting her go, after an intervention by Mrs. Clinton with the Chinese president at the time, Hu Jintao.
Gao Yaojie was part of the generation of people who came of age before the Chinese Communist Party took power in 1949.
Her parents being landowners, the gynecologist was demoted and forced to clean hospital toilets for eight years during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).
– “Shame” –
In China, reactions to his death were numerous on the internet.
“She was a remarkable person. It’s a shame that for political reasons she couldn’t pass away at home in China,” lamented a user of the Chinese social network Weibo.
Others compared Gao Yaojie to ophthalmologist Li Wenliang, another Chinese whistleblower doctor, in the early days of Covid-19 in early 2020 in China.
He had been accused by the authorities of spreading “rumors” after having alerted other doctors online about a mysterious pneumonia which would turn out to be Covid-19. The announcement of his summons by the police and especially of his death caused an outcry in public opinion.
“When I see Doctor Gao, I also think of Li Wenliang,” wrote a Weibo user, deploring the fact that his death was largely ignored by the official press.
“This is the type of person who should be honored. Instead, the media headlines focus on celebrity news,” lamented another.
published on December 12 at 7:43 a.m., AFP
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