Shuping Wang

Shuping Wang (, Wang Shuping, née Zou; 20 October 1959 – 21 September 2019) was a Chinese-American medical researcher and public health whistleblower. She exposed the poor practices that led to the spread of hepatitis C and HIV in central China in the 1990s, potentially saving tens of thousands of lives. In 2001, following harassment by Chinese officials, she moved to the United States, where she worked until her death.

Early life Wang was born Zou Shuping on 20 October 1959, in Fugou County, Henan. Her mother, Huang Yunling, worked as a village physician. Her father, Zou Bangyan, was a mathematics teacher who served as a soldier of the Kuomintang Army, which made her childhood difficult during the Cultural Revolution. She refused the Red Guards' command to denounce her parents and was expelled from school at the age of 8. When she was 13, she moved away from her village, was legally adopted by an uncle who was a member of the Communist Party, and adopted his surname, Wang. She was then allowed to continue her education. In 1991, she was assigned to work at a plasma collection center in Zhoukou, part of Henan's Plasma Economy project to pay donors for plasma donations. Wang took her data to the Ministry of Health, and in 1996, a new regulation requiring HIV screening for donors was established, and ultimately leading China to take more precautionary measures to control the epidemic.

Wang was targeted for her whistleblowing by local health officials. One retired official smashed a sign at her testing site and then struck her with a baton. Some attempted to shut down her testing site, and eventually the local utilities were cut off, which destroyed the blood samples she had collected.

According to David Cowhig, a U.S. Foreign Service officer at the Beijing embassy during the 1990s, Wang's research "was also the single most important source" that the United States had in understanding the AIDS epidemic in China, which was used in informing China–United States relations during the presidency of Bill Clinton.

Personal life Wang's first husband was Geng Honghai, an employee of the Ministry of Health. They had a daughter, Samantha Geng, a clinical pharmacist. Wang's husband Geng was shunned by his colleagues during Wang's whistleblowing campaign, and their marriage ended in divorce. After moving to the United States in 2001, Wang took the English name Sunshine. Wang never felt safe enough to return to China. In 2005, she married Gary Christensen. They adopted her elder brother's two children, Julie Zou, an army nurse, and David Zou, an engineer.

Wang died from an apparent heart attack while she was hiking with Christensen in a canyon in Salt Lake City, Utah, on 21 September 2019.