Up to 75 percent of HIV virus carriers in China's Henan Province were once illegal blood traders, said the provincial public health watchdog yesterday.

Most of them came from poor villagers in the central province and got infected during illegal trades with blood production companies in the mid-1990s, local experts said.

Henan had 35,232 reported HIV carriers by the end of last year, including 21,828 AIDS patients, according to Xinhua news agency.

Ninety percent of the carriers are farmers, and nearly 70 percent are between the ages of 30 to 50. There are 1.17 female virus carriers for every male among the total.

The province has set up several database systems, which includes 1.5 million of the local residents and migrants every year, to monitor the spread of the deadly disease.

Henan is now able to track 94.1 percent of its AIDS/HIV carriers with its current systems, significantly higher than the average domestic figure, which is 44.8 percent.

(Shanghai Daily March 13, 2007)