Fiji declares HIV outbreak a national emergency
Fiji has declared HIV a national emergency with data estimating one in 60 people in the South Pacific island nation is now infected.
The surge in new infections, which have been increasing over the last 15 years according to the Joint United Nations Program on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS), has been put down, in large part, to the growing use of injected methamphetamine.
Pacific island nations are being used as transport hubs by drug traffickers, causing a surge in methamphetamine use and transmissions of HIV. Getty Images/iStockphoto
While more than half of transmissions are due to sexual contact, at least 42 per cent of known transmissions are due to injecting drug use, UNAIDS reports.
Methamphetamine use and addiction has spread through Pacific islands including Fiji as traffickers use them as transit hubs on the way to Australia and New Zealand.
Just five years ago, only one in 167 Fijians were living with HIV. That number is now one in 60, and among pregnant women it’s one in 50, officials say.
“This means HIV is now a national crisis and the government is treating it like one. No more business as usual,” Fiji’s Health Minister Antonio Lalabalavu said in a video statement on Facebook.
“More people in Fiji are living with HIV than ever before.”
Lalabalavu declared the illness had been given “outbreak” status in January 2025 but said the Cabinet had decided this month that such a response was no longer sufficient and should be elevated to a designation of national emergency.
That required government agencies to work together with the health ministry on addressing the problem, he said.
He added that more cases were being uncovered because testing efforts were reaching more people.
Free testing and free treatment for people who tested positive will be expanded and would clean needles for drug users.
However, stigma about the illness remained an issue.
“This is about protecting people — not judging them, not watching them, not shaming them,” Lalabalavu said.
Executive Director of UNAIDS Winnie Byanyima said Fiji had “recognised the urgency of the moment and is stepping up its response”.
“It is also a stark reminder to the world that AIDS is not over,” Byanyima said.
“HIV epidemics can change quickly, and countries need health and community systems that are ready to respond urgently.”
A national HIV crisis was declared in Papua New Guinea in June last year, with infections also surging there.
Officials now fear outbreaks in other Pacific island nations with small populations where health services are limited, making the spread difficult to contain.
Reported with Associated Press
