This Tuesday, the Ministry of Health issued a document entitled "Technical Guidelines on Intervention When An Old Person Has Fallen Down". The set of guidelines carries no legal weight, but as its name suggests, is a list of pointers that the general public should be aware of when they encounter an elderly stranger on the ground who appears to be in need of help. The guidelines, while ostensibly meant to be an encouragement to please help people in need, was seen to have the opposite effect because of the following tip: "Do not rush to help, but manage according to the situation¹." This guideline elicited gasps of disbelief around China, because while people may hate to admit it out loud, there is the unspoken agreement that over-eagerness to assist has never really been a Chinese trait. more ›

"China no longer needs a revolution, the kind of total revolution that completely disrupts society. The costs are too high.” more ›

First, we're promised better tap water and now we're getting safer food too? Who is this body of authority and what have they done with our government? All joking aside, multiple government departments, including the Ministry of Health, Commerce, and Inspection and Quarantine, have come together and pledged to transmit information about food safety issues more efficiently to the public. more ›

A decade after a blood-selling scandal was revealed in China, blood has once again been called unsafe by experts, so much so that Zhao Minggang, an official with the Ministry of Health warned that blood transfusions should be avoided unless completely necessary. As if most people opt for blood transfusions out of choice! more ›

Ruhr oh, while H1N1 might have already hit its peak in the West, it seems like deaths from it are only rising in China. The number of deaths caused by swine flu here have increased sharply over the past few weeks, with he Ministry of Health’s website stating late Tuesday that the reported number of people killed has jumped to 178 from 53. "The epidemic situation in our nation remains grim,” the statement said. Back in May, we gave a couple of tips for preventing, identifying and treating H1N1. Guess it’s time to brush the dust off that again. more ›

Happy World AIDS Day! China's golden boy and long-time Houston Rockets player Yao Ming has agreed to join the United Nation's push to address discrimination among Chinese people towards those infected with HIV. The new awareness campaign follows the release of the first UNAIDS HIV/AIDS report in China last month, the results of which demonstrated the significant stigma surrounding HIV and AIDS in China's medical field as well as the general population. more ›

China’s Ministry of Health recently denied the existence of so-called ‘internet addiction’ as a problem for Chinese youth. You heard correctly- the ‘land of a thousand internet-addiction camps’ is apparently conflicted over whether to electrocute the problem out of its children or to simply ignore it entirely. more ›

Ministry of Health guidelines for Internet addiction are out and it looks like anyone who spends just 40 hours online each week can be considered an Internet addict. The draft definition was "based on research into the standards used by foreign countries and has also been influenced by China's experience with the problem," according to CRI English. We just took a good look at how many hours we're logged on each week and it seems like we could be considered internet addicts twice over. Uh oh. We hope this doesn't mean someone's booking us for one of those painfully deadly internet addict camps. more ›

Welp, they tried. Despite the makeshift hazard suit wearing airplane temperature checkers, the proposals for ever more stringent visa regulations, and everything else the government has done to try and stop swine flu, it looks like localized "cluster outbreaks" of H1N1 just can't be avoided. As Guangdong struggles with the mainland's first community outbreak, the Ministry of Health has warned that there will likely be "serious cases or even deaths." Guangdong currently has 233 known infections, the most in China. Health officials are predicting that it may be the first place in the country to experience a swine flu-related death as well. Source: SCMP more ›

We already know about the Chinese government's obsession with blocking porn. It's brought us the web portal clean up, the Green Dam and - most recently - the heinous Google block. But now they're even tearing down websites that are about sexual health. more ›

Scared of AIDS? You should be. HIV/AIDS was the leading cause of death in China last year compared with other infectious diseases, claiming almost 7000 people's lives in the first nine months of 2008. China's Ministry of Health said that until three years ago, fewer than 8000 people altogether had died from HIV/AIDS. Now the total has risen to five times that many. The main cause of transmission has switched from needle use to unsafe sex. Something to think about next time you watch your friend have one too many drinks on Tong Ren Lu. Source: BBC more ›