Back in mid-September, Vietnam's General Department of Preventive Medicine laid the cards on the table at an academic conference: the country saw roughly 10,000 new HIV infections last year. The general public didn't seem too surprised by the figure—after all, big cities see a lot of coming and going, and life moves fast.
A closer look at the data shows Ho Chi Minh City accounting for 31 percent of the total nationwide, sitting firmly at the top of the list. The neighboring Mekong Delta wasn't far behind, making up nearly another 30 percent. By official count, the total number of people living with the virus across Vietnam currently hovers around 267,000.
Sitting at a teashop in Phnom Penh sipping iced coffee while listening to locals chat, the topic came up too. Officials at the meeting were trying to figure out how to promote self-paid PrEP so high-risk groups can buy it themselves for protection. Pharmacies and clinics up and down the streets have actually been pushing screening and antiretroviral therapy for a while now—it’s just a matter of whether they can manage to drive those numbers down.
