Public health

As the deadly Ebola virus continues to plague parts of western Africa, Cambodia has since August put in place detection measures at its international airports and border crossings to screen for several diseases. ...

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on Monday unveiled a five-year Integrated Nutrition, Hygiene and Sanitation project in Cambodia, which is estimated to cost 16 million U.S. dollars, according to a press statement from the U.S. Embassy to Cambodia. ...

Manufacturers of soy and fish sauces should fortify the products with iron in order to improve Cambodians’ health, government officials said yesterday. During a workshop on iron fortification, Sat Samy, secretary of state at the Ministry of Industry and Handicrafts, called on producers to help combat ...

A draft law regulating the purchase and consumption of alcohol in Cambodia will, if passed, set the country’s legal drinking age at 21 years old, according to officials involved with the legislation, which many see as a tool to fight excessive youth drinking and drunken ...

Researchers in Colombia have conducted a promising randomised trial of a vaccine for the dengue virus, a disease that affects thousands of Cambodians every year, according to results published in the September issue of The Lancet. ...

On Thailand’s border with Myanmar, also known as Burma, a malaria research and treatment clinic is stepping up efforts to eliminate a drug-resistant form of the parasite before it spreads abroad. Artemisinin medicines have been highly effective against malaria when used in combination with other drugs. ...

The opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party plans to launch an investigation into organ trafficking in Cambodia following the mysterious case of an alleged kidney ring operating out of a military hospital in Phnom Penh. Mu Sochua, a CNRP lawmaker and head of the newly formed National ...

The two top officials in what was first reported as a kidney-trafficking ring based out of a military hospital, then later dismissed as a “training program”, have returned to work, a doctor employed there said. Lieutenant General Ly Sovan, 54-year-old director of Preah Ket Mealea hospital, ...

Recent flooding has claimed another victim, a child in Kratie province who drowned, bringing the total death toll to 30, Keo Vy, cabinet director at the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM), said yesterday. While water levels are declining across the 12 provinces affected by flooding, ...

Defense Minister Tea Banh on Wednesday denied that a kidney transplant training program at the Preah Ket Mealea military hospital is a secret, though he refused to provide details of the program, which police suspected earlier this week of being at the center of an ...

The Ministry of Defense’s account that an alleged kidney trafficking ring at its Preah Ket Mealea military hospital was in fact a fully legal training program in partnership with China’s Defense Ministry was met with questions and confusion Tuesday. A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in ...

The death toll from lethal floods has climbed to 27, with more than 10,000 families across 12 provinces evacuated from their homes to escape rising floodwaters, according to a report from the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM). The report, released yesterday, also shows that almost ...

After a two-month investigation, police were confident enough to arrest and interrogate nine people on Saturday over an alleged kidney trafficking ring at the state-run Preah Ket Mealea military hospital, including its director Ly Sovann, a lieutenant general in the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF). But ...

Police arrested nine people, including Chinese and Vietnamese nationals, on Saturday in connection with a kidney trafficking ring involving the state-run Preah Ket Mealea military hospital, officials said Sunday. Among the nine are the hospital’s director, deputy director and a Chinese professor who was training Cambodian ...

The number of dengue cases in the Kingdom is continuing to dwindle, but health officials noted a spike of rainy season-induced Japanese encephalitis over the weekend. On Saturday alone, 112 children at Kantha Bopha Children’s Hospital were diagnosed with encephalitis – brain-swelling – that was caused ...

A survey has found that while only 12 per cent of young Cambodians smoke cigarettes, more than four times that number are exposed to passive smoke every day, and a broad majority back tougher regulation of tobacco products. Mom Kong, executive director at the Cambodian Movement ...

Cambodia has not seen any case related to the West Africa-hit Ebola virus disease and called for its citizens to take precautionary measures against the virus, said a joint statement released by the Health Ministry and the World Health Organization on Tuesday. ...

Drug-resistant malaria is now widespread in Southeast Asia, seriously threatening global efforts to control malaria, a new study warned Wednesday. An analysis of blood samples from 1,241 malaria patients in 10 countries across Asia and Africa found resistance to the world’s most effective anti-malarial drug, artemisinin, ...

Experts fear Cambodia’s well-earned reputation as a leader in the fight against HIV/AIDS could be undermined by government policy targeting the country’s high-risk groups. Over the past 15 years, government action and large amounts of money from donors have seen the infection rate drop from 2 ...

The German ambassador, Joachim Baron von Marschall, signed an agreement with the permanent Deputy Prime Minister Keat Chhon yesterday for €47 million ($64 million) in aid. The grant will be used for developing projects within the ministries of health, rural development and women’s affairs. ...

Decriminalising sex work could slash the world’s HIV infections by a third or more, according to a new study. Published yesterday in health journal The Lancet, the paper says that punitive treatment of sex workers can “elevate HIV acquisition and transmission risks”. In Cambodia, which has Southeast Asia’s ...

Cambodia’s efforts to tackle HIV/AIDS over the past 15 years have won it praise, and put it well ahead of many other low-income countries.  But some of those most involved in the fight against AIDS are worried that an array of challenges could see some of ...

At nearly half of the Kingdom’s primary schools, students have to make a daily choice between drinking contaminated water or going thirsty, a dilemma the government hopes to soon banish with new minimum sanitation and safe water standards. The guidelines, which have yet to be finalised ...

Five Cambodians have died from malaria in the first six months of the year, down from six during the same period last year, while the number of recorded cases of the disease has dropped by about 20 percent compared to last year, according to the ...