LAST-MINUTE PREPARATION: On August 4, soldiers of air defense forces stationed in Shandong Province install a missile to be launched during a military drill on reconnaissance, early warning, electromagnetic interference and ground-to-air attacks (JI LIANGYAN)

Fighting AIDS

China's Health Ministry detailed a plan to fight co-infection of HIV and tuberculosis (TB) on August 3.

A ministry circular to health authorities across China said TB infection had become one of the leading causes of death among people living with HIV.

The ministry ordered HIV/AIDS prevention and control authorities nationwide and those responsible for fighting TB to step up cooperation in data sharing and testing.

The ministry ordered free treatment and follow-up visits to patients co-infected with HIV and TB once detected.

It required HIV/AIDS prevention authorities to provide at least one TB examination to people with HIV or AIDS patients every year.

An estimated 700,000 people live with HIV in China. In 2008, China reported that AIDS had become the country's leading lethal infectious disease for the first time.

Education Loopholes

The Internet is the most important source of information about sexual knowledge for Chinese teenagers, as sex education at school and home is inadequate, according to a survey.

More than three quarters of the survey's 3,000 teenage respondents said the Internet is their most important source of information about sex. Books and friends were the next most important. School and parents ranked as the two least important sources.

The China Youth Daily newspaper conducted the survey. Still, 71 percent of the respondents believed obscene content on the Internet disturbs teenagers.

Panda Boom

The population of giant pandas living in the wild in southwest China's Sichuan Province has risen by 33 percent in the last three decades to 1,206, the local government said.

"Altogether 1,206 giant pandas are living in the mountains of Sichuan, making up at least 76 percent of China's total," the provincial forestry department said in a press release on August 2.

The endangered bears are found in 10 city and prefecture areas, it said. Another 246 pandas are living in captivity at the giant panda protection and research center in Wolong and the Chengdu research base, the world's two largest centers for artificial breeding of the bears.

Sichuan has 41 nature reserves for giant pandas covering 2.34 million hectares in total.

Property Market

China provided 56,000 hectares of land for residential use in the first six months of 2010, up 135 percent over the same period last year, according to the Ministry of Land and Resources.

A significant increase in the availability of land for housing was reported in areas like Beijing Municipality, Guizhou, Jiangxi, Heilongjiang provinces and the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, said a statement on the ministry's website.

China implemented a series of measures to rein in soaring home prices and curb property market speculation in April. The measures included tighter scrutiny of applications for financing, limiting of loans for third-home purchases and higher down payments for buying second-homes.

Latest data indicated the red-hot property market has started cooling as average housing prices in 70 major cities fell 0.1 percent in June from May.