China – the world’s most populous nation – is facing an AIDS epidemic on an alarming scale.  By 2010, 10 million Chinese could be HIV-positive, according to UNAIDS.  AIDS is spreading quickly in China’s rural areas, where stigma, fear and lack of understanding feed the crisis.

Mobilizing for Life
World Relief’s Mobilizing for Life initiative helps China’s indigenous churches tackle the serious problems caused by AIDS and empowers the Christian community to take a compassionate stand.

In 2003, God opened a door in the fight against AIDS, and World Relief became the first international Christian agency to work with the China Christian Council to confront AIDS.  Our relationship with the registered Chinese church allows World Relief to work transparently with local congregations and openly as an international agency – enabling us to fulfill our mission.

Breathing life and hope into China’s churches and their surrounding communities, World Relief is strengthening people physically and spiritually – as well as building local churches’ credibility and visibility.  Our Mobilizing for Life program has conducted numerous training sessions in several cities for local health officials, medical doctors, church volunteers and caregivers in the Hunan and Henan provinces, equipping them with the knowledge and tools they need to respond effectively within their communities.

“The church is a very good organization to let people with AIDS know that we love them,” explains a local volunteer.  “We can kneel and pray with them.  It is God who gives this love…we have the opportunity to prevent (people living with AIDS) from being seen as criminals, but instead as people.”

Our simple Hope at Home booklet (translated into Chinese and Uigur) shows local people how to care for family or neighbors living with AIDS, while our training sessions seek to de-mystify AIDS and fight the stigma often attached.  The Chinese version of our AIDS training manual Facing AIDS Together is used in churches and hospitals.

Volunteers
In the city of Hengyang, World Relief helped set up the first AIDS Care Hotline.  The hotline is manned by volunteers from all walks of life, including local teachers, doctors, officials and Christians.  The volunteers receive monthly training on telephone counseling.

At a local church in Hunan, World Relief mobilized volunteers to visit households affected by AIDS.  Church members visited a remote village in the mountains – a three-hour trek.  When they arrived at the village, they encouraged orphans and their caregivers, distributing rice to the most vulnerable households.  Afterwards, local officials expressed their appreciation, specifically highlighting the role of the local church.

World Relief’s goal is to expand its reach in China, fostering a grassroots network of stigma reduction, preventive AIDS education, orphan support and home-based care.