Analysis of Chinese AIDS epidemic shows surprising patterns

The mountainous Chinese province of Yunnan is tucked into the country’s southwest corner, a scenic region that borders Burma, Laos and Vietnam. The province shares its rugged topography with the surrounding countries, but it shares a less favorable trait as well: a growing AIDS epidemic, driven by a thriving underground commercial sex trade and by heroin smuggled in from the opium-growing regions of its three neighbors, an area known as the “golden triangle.”