Fiji declares national HIV crisis

SYDNEY

This file photo taken on April 20, 2026 shows an HIV awareness poster displayed along a main road in Suva, as health authorities and aid agencies step up public messaging amid a surge in HIV cases in Fiji. (AFP Photo)

Fiji has declared a national HIV crisis as sexual transmission and illicit drug use help to spread the virus, now infecting an estimated one in 60 adults in the Pacific nation.

New HIV diagnoses surged to 2,016 cases in 2025, 16 times the level recorded in 2019, authorities said, vowing a “whole of government” response.

“I am formally declaring a national HIV emergency in Fiji,” Health Minister Atonio Lalabalavu told reporters on Sept. 16.

“This decision recognizes the seriousness of the epidemic and the urgent, coordinated response our country now needs.”

An estimated one in 60 adults in Fiji have HIV, up from one in 167 five years earlier, the government said.

Two in every 100 pregnant women carry the virus, it said. Of the 59 babies born with HIV in 2025, 18 died before their first birthday.

The government said it was expanding access to free HIV testing, prevention services and treatment.

“This includes rapid testing, prevention medicine for people at higher risk, harm-reduction measures for people who inject drugs, and free treatment for people diagnosed with HIV.”

Among HIV cases with a known mode of transmission, more than half were linked to sexual transmission and more than 42 percent to injecting drug use, UNAIDS said.

The U.N. agency welcomed Fiji’s plans to introduce legislation for a needle and syringe program.

“Fiji still has an opportunity to change the course of this epidemic,” said Eamonn Murphy, UNAIDS director for regions including Asia and the Pacific.