Public health

In Roka commune, money is getting tight.After an HIV outbreak in 2014 saw 264 people infected in the small northwest Cambodian village, aid flowed in, showily. The prime minister’s wife delivered hundreds of kilos of rice, the health minister brought socks and sarongs, nongovernmental organizations ...

A recent study of Cambodian monkeys found that nonhuman primates can host viruses previously thought to only infect humans. ...

Following two strenuous days of races at the Water Festival this week, boatman Sgnoun Chai celebrated its conclusion on Wednesday with a night on the town. ...

Three women and four kids fell ill after ingesting pesticides and were transported to a local hospital nearby yesterday in Kampong Chnang city. ...

Eight people have died of malaria so far this year across the country, according to the government’s latest figures. The deaths mean Cambodia has missed its goal to eliminate fatalities from the mosquito-borne parasite by 2015, though health officials questioned the number—and even the target. ...

Local innovations have catapulted Cambodia, which has long had dire toilet use numbers, to be a leader in sanitation. On World Toilet Day, the country gears up to attain ambitious new targets, Joanna Mayhew reports. ...

More than 2,000 ducks have died from the H5N1 bird flu in Siem Reap and Battambang provinces since Thursday in the first outbreak of the virus since March 2014, according to officials and the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) on Tuesday. ...

Cambodia reported two outbreaks of the highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu virus among backyard duck flocks in the northwestern part of the country, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) said on Monday. ...

Fleeing strict new laws at home, surrogacy companies are moving their “wombs for rent” services from Thailand to Cambodia, causing some analysts to raise concerns that would-be parents could be swindled by the little-regulated industry. ...

At a small food shop in Phnom Penh recently, customers crowded in, eating hotdogs and meatballs. These kinds of processed meats are widely popular in Cambodia, and business was brisk. Few here seem to be concerned by new warnings from the World Health Organization that ...

A groundbreaking new study on human transmission of the dengue virus conducted in Kompong Cham province has shown that the virus can be spread back to mosquitoes by asymptomatic carriers, who are actually more infectious than those displaying symptoms. ...

The international market for surrogacy is proving to be very resilient in the face of legal and social disruption. Now that India, Nepal and Thailand have banned international clients from using local surrogates, clinics and brokers are shifting their business to Cambodia. ...

The health minister on Friday defended the government’s failure to fine or shut down any of the private clinics that are currently illegally promoting baby formula to new mothers, saying that more time was needed for committees to “investigate” the breaches. ...

After years of research and testing, a nutritional snack meant to halt rampant malnourishment and stunting among Cambodian children has been developed in the form of a fish paste-filled wafer, which will be released on the market by 2017. ...

The United Nations has expressed admiration to Cambodia for having responded successfully to the spread of HIV/AIDS, reported the state news agency-AKP. According to an official report, Cambodia has currently over 700,000 people living with HIV/AIDS and some 500,000 of them are receiving antiretroviral treatment. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has called for stronger enforcement of regulations on the promotion and sale of baby formula, linking a decrease in the number of women who breast-feed to an increase in un­lawful and misleading advertising that misrepresents milk substitutes and deceives new mothers. ...

Som Saron has not worked since testing positive for HIV late last year. Taking care of her young niece at her parents’ home in Roka commune last week, the 37-year-old said that a fear of being stigmatized kept her from walking the community’s gravel roads selling ...

Three weeks after the Health Ministry announced that measles had reappeared in Cambodia, a ministry official said Thursday that the highly contagious disease had in fact not been found. ...

Baby formula companies are pushing their products in clinics and on health care professionals—some with great effect—despite a government ban on such acts and extensive research showing that formula is an inferior alternative to mother’s milk. ...

The percentage of smokers over the age of 15 has dropped from 19.5 percent in 2011 to 16.9 percent last year, according to the National Adult Tobacco Survey which was released yesterday by the National Institute of Statistics. ...

A doctor who had been accused of causing a woman to die in labour because he abandoned her during childbirth to go to a party had charges against him dropped by the Court of Appeal on Monday. ...

A Cambodian medical research­er has received international rec­ognition for a presentation on de­velopments in the treatment of pa­tients infected with both HIV and tuberculosis at a conference in France last week. ...

Cambodia’s efforts in HIV prevention and treatment have shown significant results in the past ten years and the government is now setting the bar even higher. Last December, Prime Minister Hun Sen committed to stopping new HIV infections by 2020. ...

More than 20 HIV-infected villagers provided testimony during the third day of the trial of an unlicensed medic—accused of infecting more than 270 people with the virus—at the Battambang Provincial Court on Thursday, a court official said. ...