The China Food and Drug Administration approved the domestically developed, long-acting injectable HIV drug Albuvirtide.

It is the world's first long-acting intravenous treatment for HIV, the Science and Technology Daily reported on Tuesday.

Developed by the Nanjing-based Frontier Biotechnologies Inc, the drug can block the fusion of the viral and host cell membranes, interrupting the HIV life cycle in its earliest stage, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

The drug is a fusion inhibitor that should be used with antiretroviral drugs to treat people suffering from HIV who have received antiviral therapy.

"China's first domestically developed drug offers new HIV patients a new treatment option. We hope to dispel the fact that China has not developed good anti-HIV medicine," Xie Dong, chief scientist and former head of Frontier Biotechnologies Inc, said.

Data show 718,270 people suffer from HIV/AIDS in China. As of the end of June 2017, 221,628 people had died of AIDS-related diseases in China, Xinhua reported in December 2017.