Fiji declares national crisis as HIV epidemic escalates

The crisis has its roots in drugs. The archipelago has long been a strategic stop-off point on the “drugs superhighway” from the Americas and Southeast Asia to Australia and New Zealand, but methamphetamines are increasingly spilling into a domestic market.

This has driven an HIV crisis because of the way these drugs are being used: the widespread sharing of blood, needles and syringes has transformed a small, background outbreak spreading via unprotected sex into an explosive epidemic.

“It’s a clash of two epidemics,” Eamonn Murphy, the Asia-Pacific director at UNAIDS, told the Telegraph. “[Methamphetamines] fuelled the flames. Fiji had a small fire, but throw injecting drug use on it and see where we get: a 12-fold increase in just 12 years.”

Although the Pacific nation formally announced an outbreak in January 2025 – mobilising $10m Fijian (£3m) and creating a national HIV taskforce – the country has still struggled to rein in transmission.

One major problem has been delays in the introduction of a needle and syringe programme, because of politics, red tape and stigma in the largely Christian and conservative country.

The scheme, which had hoped to launch at the start of the year, is considered critical because a major driver of new infections has been a lack of access to clean needles and syringes. Despite existing research, critics have claimed it will encourage drug use – and with an election next year, the subject has become contentious.