Chinese county of eternal youth under threat from gravely ill seeking cures

Bama, a county tucked amid the green rivers and humid jungle of central Guangxi province, is famed for its centenarians. Scientists have studied their DNA in search of clues to the villagers' longevity, entrepreneurs have marketed their rice and bottled their water, and tourists have marvelled at people twice their age striding up slopes at dawn to work in far-off fields.

Lately Bama has attracted a different type of visitor - people battling life-threatening diseases, in many cases cancer, who have nowhere else to turn after hospital treatments and traditional medicine have failed. They come in the belief that copying the habits of the centenarians and living in an unsoiled environment can help them with their illnesses.

But the influx of arrivals, in addition to the usual "golden week" crush of sightseers, has upended Bama's traditional society and altered its economy. In a grim irony, these medical pilgrims are transforming the very "paradise" they hope will bless them with a cure.

"No one could say when … cancer patients first started to move here and battle their diseases," said Li Li , a 53-year-old writer who has been struggling with bladder cancer for years.

"I came here for the first time last January and already found tens of thousands of migrants here, all suffering from fatal diseases," Li said. "I make friends with so many fellow companions in misfortune here. About 60 per cent of them are cancer patients and the rest suffer from other severe chronic illnesses."

Bama's reputation for its healthy, long-living villagers extends back centuries. The Jiaqing Emperor, who reigned during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911), was so inspired by a resident said to be 142 years old that he wrote a poem in the person's honour.