UN gives advice on fighting AIDS

China gets good marks for openness but needs to speed up efforts to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS by increasing the involvement of civil organizations and enlisting the help of companies, a UN official has said.

Peter Piot, head of the UN AIDS agency UNAIDS, said the transparency of Beijing's official policy toward AIDS deserved praise.

China reported 18,543 new cases of HIV/AIDS in the first half of 2007, the Xinhua News Agency said on Saturday, almost the same as last year. The country has an estimated 650,000 people with HIV/AIDS.