Mission Impossible: The American Schistosomiasis Delegation’s Visit to China in 1975

INTRODUCTION In 1949, the establishment of the Peo-ple's Republic of China (PRC †) resulted in the cessation of mainland China's diplomatic ties with Western countries. Only after U.S. President Richard Nixon's visit to China and the signing of the Shanghai Communiqué in 1972 were Sino-American diplomatic relations formally established. Academic exchanges between the PRC and the United States then began. Formed in 1966, the Committee on Scholarly Communication with the PRC (CSCPRC) had, since 1973, facilitated many U.S. scholars' visits to China by acting as liaison with its Chinese counterpart (mainly Chinese Academy of Science) and providing economic support. Between 1973 and 1978, several American delegations traveled to China on scientific and academic exchanges concerning matters such as acupuncture anesthesia, herbal pharmacology, paleanthropology, insect control, and plant studies. The Ameri-can Schistosomiasis Delegation (ASD) was among the exchange groups [1]. The CSCPRC began discussing a study tour on schistosomiasis with the PRC Scientific and Technical Association in May 1973; a trip took place from April 8 to May 2, 1975. Unlike members of other scholarly delegations, the ASD members were dissatisfied with the tour because they were not granted access to the places and people they had wanted to visit and meet, so no significant achievements resulted from their trip. Their hosts, members of the Chi-nese Medical Association, however, were less concerned with engaging in meaningful scientific exchanges. Instead of providing the necessary assistance to the ASD, they frequently controlled the delegation's itinerary and withheld information from them. The ASD issued a report in The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene [2], in which it commented on the manner in which the Chinese medical scientists had hosted the visit. This paper attempts to place the problems encountered by theASD in China in a historical context and explore why in 1975 the Chinese Medical Association, as the official host, was reluctant to show the delegation the actual extent of schistosomiasis infection in the PRC. 1