Positive Lives, Ordinary People: Art and Action in the Fight Against AIDS in China Speaker Bios Vishakha Desai President Asia Society Vishakha N. Desai is the sixth president of the Asia Society. Since 1990, Dr. Desai has served the Asia Society in various leadership capacities most recently as Senior Vice President and Director of the Museum and Cultural Programs. She was responsible for the management of the Society's $40 million renovation of its New York City headquarters and for the inaugural opening season of the Asia Society and Museum in November 2001. The new facilities have generated a marked growth and diversification of the Society's programming, audiences and funding sources. A scholar of classical Indian art, Dr. Desai has built an international reputation for introducing contemporary Asian art to a broad audience and using it to illuminate historical trends and their influence on the development of today's society. She has also been at the forefront of integrating Asian American issues into the Society's public programs, which encompass a wide array of creative, social, political and business topics. Prior to joining the Asia Society Dr. Desai was a curator of Indian, Southeast Asian and Islamic art at The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, where she also served as head of public programs and academic affairs. She has also taught at the University of Massachusetts, Boston University and Columbia University. Dr. Desai received her B.A. from Bombay University and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. In 1996 Susquehanna University awarded her an Honorary Doctorate in Arts.

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Kevin Frost Vice President for Global Initiatives and Director of TREAT Asia American Foundation for AIDS Research Kevin Robert Frost joined the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR) in September 1994 and in 1997 became Director of Clinical Research and Information. As head of that department, he managed the implementation of amfAR's clinical research program, provided oversight for the continued evolution of the HIV/AIDS Treatment Directory, and was instrumental in the development of amfAR's new Public and Professional Education department. Early in 2000, Mr. Frost was promoted to the position of Vice President of Clinical Research and Prevention Programs. In this capacity, he continues to oversee the clinical research program, which conducts multi-center clinical trials for HIV and its related opportunistic infections. He also oversees and provides guidance for several of amfAR's program areas, including treatment information, public and professional education, prevention (including needle exchange), grants administration and global initiatives (including the TREAT Asia initiative). In 2000, as a member of a Beijing delegation organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Mr. Frost met with China's Ministry of Health and local health organizations to discuss the country's plans to combat HIV/AIDS. Mr. Frost also served as a member of the international advisory committee for the XIV International AIDS Conference in Barcelona, Spain. Mr. Frost is a member of the advisory board of Collaborations in HIV Outcomes Research/US (CHORUS). He has written articles for GMHC's treatment issues newsletter Positively Aware, and has published in the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, Journal of Infectious Diseases, and The AIDS Reader. Thomas Project Director AIDS Care China Thomas is the project director of AIDS Care China, a GIPA initiative project which aims to empower people with HIV/AIDS to take an active role in the response to the epidemic. Prior to joining AIDS Care China in 2002, Thomas was the manager of the Care Home Project, organizing care and support for homeless people living with HIV/AIDS in the Guangdong Province. He has participated in numerous workshops and summits on HIV/AIDS, capacity building and leadership, both within China and abroad. Thomas attended the Wunhan Iron-Steel Institute of Education and the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Marina Mahathir President Malaysian AIDS Council Marina Mahathir is President of the Malaysian AIDS Council (MAC), an umbrella body of 37 NGOs working on HIV/AIDS in Malaysia, and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Malaysian AIDS Foundation. She represents MAC at the Country Coordinating Mechanism on HIV/AIDS and in other Government-NGO forums. In 1997 Ms. Mahathir was appointed to the National Women's Advisory Council. In 1996, she was elected Vice-President of the AIDS Society of Asia and the Pacific and was the Asia/Pacific NGO representative to the Program Coordinating Board of the Joint UN Program on AIDS (UNAIDS) from 1997-2000.In 1999, she chaired the 5th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP) in Kuala Lumpur, and she sits on the International Advisory Committee of the subsequent ICAAPs. In 2001, she was part of the Malaysian government delegation to the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS, and in 2003 chaired the 2nd International Muslim Leaders' Consultation on HIV/AIDS. In addition to her work in HIV/AIDS, Ms. Mahathir writes a fortnightly current issues column in the Star newspaper, has published a book of her columns entitled "In Liberal Doses" and is Co-Executive Producer of a television program for young women called 3R Respect, Relax and Respond. Jing Jun Professor and Director, Social Policy Research Institute Tsinghua University Mr. Jing Jun holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Harvard University. From 1994 to 2000, he taught anthropology at the City University of New York, where he was tenured before returning to China to work at Tsinghua University, Beijing. In the last three years, he has served as a consultant for the UNDP and the Department for International Development (U.K.) for their AIDS work in China. He is a policy advisor for China's National Center for HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control and the China-UK HIV/AIDS Prevention and Care Project. His work on AIDS includes a study of four rural communities in central China where hundreds of poor farmers became infected with HIV in the process of selling blood at government and private blood banks where the collection procedures were unsafe. He also has studied prisons and trucking routes in southwest China to assess the impact of intravenous drug use and prostitution on China's HIV/AIDS epidemic. His writings on HIV/AIDS include "China and AIDS: The Time to Act Is Now" (Science, June 28, 2002, co-authored with Joan Kaufman), "AIDS and China's Ethnic Minorities" (China Health Development Forum, June 4, 2002), and "AIDS and China's Disadvantaged Groups" (Conference on Social Sciences and HIV/AIDS Prevention in China, January 8, 2001). At Tsinghua University, Prof. Jing holds a joint appointment in the Department of Sociology and the School of Public Policy. He also directs Tsinghua University's Social Policy Research Institute. He is currently working with his colleagues to set up a joint training program at Tsinghua University's School of Law, School of Public Policy, School of Journalism, School of Social Sciences, and School of Medicine so as to offer intensive courses and organize field trips for senior and middle-ranking government officials to develop a better understanding of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in China. Li Xiguang Director/Professor of the Center for International Communications Studies Academic Dean of the School of Journalism and Communication Tsinghua University Li Xiguang, Director/Professor of the Center for International Communications Studies, Academic Dean of the School of Journalism and Communication, Tsinghua University. Research Fellow (1999) at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University; senior editor and director of the political desk of Xinhua News Agency (1996-1998); science writer(1995) with the Washington Post, Senior writer with Xinhua News Agency(1993-1995), Young Scholar of UNESCO Silk Roads Project(1990-1992), science writer with Xinhua News Agency(1988-1990),the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences(LLM, 1985-1988); assistant researcher at the Institute for Theoretical Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences(1982-1988); the Foreign Languages and Literature Department, Nanjing University(B.A.1978-1982); Guest professor at Nanjing University, Hong Kong University, Sichuan University, Northwestern Political and Legal University. Recent books (including co-authored): Journalism in Transition, Soft Power and Global Communications, The HIV/AIDS Media Book, The Deformed Press, The Art of Looking for Stories, The Next Media, New Global Communications, Media Power, Essential Journalism, Reshaping Newsroom, Online Journalists, Media Bombing and Demonization. Bob Meyers President National Press Foundation Bob Meyers joined the National Press Foundation in 1993 as director of its Washington Journalism Center. He was appointed President of the foundation in 1995. From 1989 to 1993 Meyers was director of the Harvard Journalism Fellowship for Advanced Studies in Public Health. He is a former reporter for the Washington Post, and a former assistant city editor at the San Diego Union. He has written two books, Like Normal People and D.E.S.: The Bitter Pill. Educated in the New York City public schools system and at UCLA, Mr. Meyers was awarded an academic fellowship at Harvard's Center for Health Communication in 1987-88. He is a member of the Fellowship Advisory Board of the Rosalynn Carter Fellowships for Mental Health Journalism. He has lectured at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and Tsinghua University in Beijing. Kevin Ryan Director Positive Lives Holding degrees in Commerce and Law, Kevin Ryan qualified as a lawyer in 1980 and was, for a number of years, a partner in an international law firm based in London. He specialised in international multi-jurisdictional commercial disputes and represented various international companies. He has been past president and board member of the business and cultural organisation, Australian Business in Europe. However, during his professional career, Mr. Ryan has also worked extensively as a volunteer lawyer in the area of HIV education. He advises a variety of international and local organisations, specialising in HIV/AIDS education and policy. He runs seminars and training programmes, in particular, on discrimination, stigma, human rights, policy & legislative approaches. Currently Mr. Ryan is the volunteer project director of Positive Lives, the global HIV photographic project, working with communities around the world. He has also recently been appointed to the board as a trustee of NAM, a charity specialising in the provision of HIV education, information and medical analysis, which is utilised by individuals living with HIV, health care professionals and organisations. Mr. Ryan has been living with a HIV positive diagnosis for many years. Ray Yip Country Director for China of the Global AIDS Program US CDC Dr. Ray Yip is the Country Director for China of the Global AIDS Program (GAP), CDC. He is also the special advisor for UNICEF China. Dr. Yip joined CDC in 1984, and specialized in international nutrition and child health issues. Dr. Yip has been assigned in China since 1998 in assisting the MOH and China CDC in program operation related to heath system reform, maternal and child health, nutrition, and prevention of HIV/AIDS. Dr. Yip's involvement with AIDS issue started in 1983 with hemophilia children while working as a pediatric hematologist at University of California in San Francisco. In 1991, he participated in the assessment of HIV outbreaks due to unsafe injection in Romania. Starting 2000, Dr. Yip became actively engaged in the AIDS response effort in China as the program manager of UNICEF including the development of the first PMTCT program in China. As the GAP director, the focus is on rapid build up of surveillance system, and prevention of secondary transmission of HIV through improved testing and adequate follow-up for those who ware found HIV positive. Dr. Yip is a graduate of the Medical School and School of Public Health of the University of Minnesota, and current holds an appointment of Adjunct Professor of International Health at Tulane University. Xia Guomei Director, HIV/AIDS Social Policy Research Center, Shanghai Academy of Social Science Xia Guomei, Female, Director of HIV/AIDS Social Policy Research Center, Researcher of Institute of Sociology, Shanghai Academy of Social Science. Visit scholar of Old Dominin University of America during 2004. She mainly engages in research on AIDS / Venereal Disease, Women and Edge Group. She has delivered nearly 60 theses and survey reports, and 5 monographs in addition. She has published Report on Chinese HIV/AIDS Problem and HIV/AIDS in China (English) in recent years. In 2002, she conducted a program of NUDP, named "Law, Regulation and Policy of AIDS in China: Social Influence and Effect"; in 2003, she launched AIDS Training in civil servants in Shanghai; and held the forum "Social Science and AIDS: Theory and Practice" in Shanghai Academy of Social Science in the same year; the Conference on HIV/AIDS Legislation which was held cooperatively by Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Shanghai Society of Law and Shanghai Institute of Legislation in 2004, was presided over Mrs. Xia. She published the theses "On Framework for HIV/AIDS Legislation in China"together with Professor Scott Burris of Temple University. With Professor Xiushi Yang of Old Dominion University, she published the theses "The field that needs to be paid attention to - Research on the high dangerous and social intervention of AIDS in market for entertainment-under human safe vision". She has been the consultant of several international collaborative programs; and has been invited to make speeches on "Chinese AIDS problem under sociology vision" in Beijing University, Tsinghua University, Fudan University, Shanghai Jiaotong University, East China Normal University and American Yale University, etc. What programs she presides over at present are research on behavior intervention among female floating population, research on Chinese AIDS social prevention pattern, and research on AIDS legislation. Ni Zheng Deputy Director Shanghai Minhang Center for Disease Control and Prevention Ni Zheng, female, born in 1957. Dr. Ni is the chief doctors and deputy director of Shanghai Minhang Center for Disease Control and Prevention. She is the visiting professor of School of Public Health, Fudan University. Dr. Ni was graduated from the school of public health, Shanghai medical university in 1980, and completed her master program of social medicine and health services administration at the same university in 1997. Ni Zheng was honored as one of the one hundred key persons in health care system of Shanghai in 1999. She has been being the PI of one national project, three municipal projects and 3 local projects on AIDS and TB control research. During last five years, Dr. Ni has published more than 30 papers on academic journals, and obtained the 2nd prize of Minghang District Science and Technology Award, the 2nd prize of national outstanding academic contribution award and obtained twice the 2nd prize of outstanding academic contribution award on medicine and health in China. Li Yifei Chief Representative, Viacom China Senior Vice President, MTV Networks Asia Managing Director, MTV Networks China Li Yifei is the Senior Vice President of MTV Networks Asia, Managing Director of MTV China and Chief Representative of Viacom China. She is responsible for both MTV and Nickelodeon's businesses in China. Prior to joining MTV, Yifei was most recently Managing Director at Burson-Marsteller China. A Chinese national, Yifei Li has spent nearly 10 years studying and working in the United States. From 1987-90, she worked in the Department of Public Information as assistant producer at United Nations in New York. A native of Beijing, Yifei Li has a Bachelor of Law degree from Foreign Affairs Institute in Beijing and an MA degree in International Relations from Baylor University in the U.S. Yifei Li was a national champion in Chinese Martial Arts. She was most recently selected as 25 Rising Stars-Global Leaders For The Next Generation in May of 2001 and was on the cover of Fortune Magazine. She was subsequently selected as 50 Most Powerful Women by Fortune Magazine in October of 2001. Copyright © 2004. Asia Society. All rights reserved. Please click here for legal restrictions and terms of use applicable to this site and Asia Society's Privacy Policy.