China will deploy a modern vocational education program to improve the quality of the country's vast labor force and increase employment.

The State Council, China's cabinet, says this program is a strategic move for the country's economic transformation and improvement of people's wellbeing.

The Chinese government has advocated a contemporary vocational education that helps nurture tens of millions of engineers and technical workers, and 'open a gate of success for young people'.

A recent statement from the State Council says China will also enhance market competitiveness of products made in China to help upgrade the Chinese economy.

New measures to strengthen vocational education include giving vocational schools more decision-making power.

A talent cultivation mechanism will be set up to allow schools and enterprises to jointly recruit and train talents.

China's food and drug safety watchdog has revoked licenses of around 70 drug businesses in a crackdown on illegal drug-related operations since last July.

China Food and Drug Administration says almost 500 cases involving illegal or criminal practices were handed over to police authorities during the crackdown.

The administration has ordered some 1,000 drug producers and dealers to suspend business and has withdrawn over 250 good practice certificates.

In July last year, the administration launched a six-month crackdown on illegal drug-related production and operations.

The campaign especially targeted at violations in the traditional Chinese medicine market and online drug sales.

It is also aimed at establishing more regulations and mechanisms to intensify management, and better control drug safety risks.

In a related development, China's Food and Drug Administration has launched a trial program in which food producers will have their own chief safety officers.

A chief safety officer will be appointed by the owner of a food producer. The officer will be responsible for all issues regarding the safety of food produced by the company.

The Food and Drug Administration hopes this will solve the problem in which everyone in the management is responsible for food safety, but actually, no one is doing the job.

Meanwhile, the whole process from production to sales will be recorded and be made traceable.

The growing number of cell phone users in China has led to a surge in data flow as more of them access mobile Internet via their phones.

A latest government data shows the number of cell phone users in China hit 1.2 billion in January, up over 6 million from December last year.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology says the increase has boosted mobile Internet traffic, which reached 133 million gigabytes in January, up almost 50 percent year on year.

Business revenues of mobile telecommunications hit almost 70 billion yuan, or about 11 billion U.S. dollars in January, up 11 percent year on year.

Exciting research suggests that a shot every one to three months may someday give an alternative to the daily pills that some people take now to cut their risk of getting HIV.

The experimental drug has only been tested in monkeys, but it completely protected them from infection.

A US AIDS expert hails the move as the most exciting innovation in the field of HIV prevention.

Dr. Robert Grant is an AIDS expert at the Gladstone Institutes, a foundation affiliated with the University of California in San Francisco. He says the study has showed 100 percent protection.

The doctor says if the drug works and proves to be safe, it would allow for HIV to be prevented with periodic injections, perhaps every three months.

You're listening to NEWS Plus Special English. I'm Yun Feng in Beijing. You can access our program by logging onto NEWSPlusRadio.cn. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let us know by e-mailing us at [email protected]. That's [email protected]. Now the news continues.

The World Health Organization calls Dengue fever one of the greatest threats to global health.

The WHO says a hundred million new cases are reported each year, mainly in urban areas of the tropics.

Despite attempts to control mosquitoes that spread the disease, the number of cases in Malaysia has witnessed a serious spike already this year.

Municipal crews swoop into action after several reports of dengue fever in a Kuala Lumpur suburb.

To combat the disease, conventional methods like inspections, fogging and public education remain crucial.

Health officials are calling for concerted efforts against mosquitoes to turn the tide against this 21st century plague.

A new study in Finland shows healthy diet in midlife decreases risk of memory disorder in old age.

This healthy diet contains abundant vegetables, fruits, berries and fish.

Meanwhile, an unhealthy diet with a lot of saturated fatty acid significantly increases risks of dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

Scientists in the University of Eastern Finland randomly selected a total of 2,000 people aged 50 during the years between 1972 and 1987.

Their diet information was obtained through questionnaires and interviews.

Re-examination was conducted in 1998 to check the health conditions of 1,500 survivors aged 65 to 79.

Compared with the group of people whose diet was the least healthy, those who ate the healthiest food had their risks of dementia and Alzheimer's disease reduced by around 90 percent.

The study also shows that a diet with abundant unsaturated fatty acid, Vitamin C, Vitamin B12 and folic acid helps enhance memory.

Additionally, the study shows that coffee can prevent memory disorder in old age.

People who drank 3 to 5 cups of coffee per day at midlife had less risks of suffering from dementia in old age than those who drank less than 3 cups of coffee per day.