Doctor and self-exiled activist Gao Yaojie who exposed the AIDS epidemic in rural China dies at 95

By SIMINA MISTREANU
Associated Press

Renowned Chinese doctor and activist Gao Yaojie who exposed the AIDS virus epidemic in rural China in the 1990s, has died at the age of 95 at her home in the United States. Gao’s outspokenness about the virus outbreak embarrassed the Chinese government and drove her to live in self-exile for over a decade in Manhattan, New York. Lin Shiyu, a woman close to Gao and who compiled an oral history of her, confirmed to The Associated Press in an email Monday the physician’s death. Gao became China’s most well-known AIDS activist after speaking out against blood-selling schemes that infected thousands with HIV.