Fiji’s HIV cases surge due to bluetoothing, chemsex and needle-sharing

On: This is the age of the youngest of the youngest HIV that Sesini Naitalla met.

When he first started Fiji’s Survivor Defending Network in 2013, that young boy was not born yet. Now, in recent years, one of the thousands of Fiji, which contract with blood -based viruses – many of them are 19 or smaller and many through intravenous drug use.

“More young drugs are using drugs, Na Naital gives support to sex workers and drug users in Suva, Fiji, Suva. “He was one of the young people who shared needles on the street during Covid.”

In the last five years, Fiji, a small South Pacific country with a population of less than one million, has become the focus of one of the fastest growing HIV outbreaks in the world.

In 2014, the country had less than 500 people living with HIV. Until 2024, this number rose to about 5,900 – one eleven jump.

In the same year, Fiji recorded 1,583 new cases-thirteen-fold increased in the usual five-year average. 41 of them were 15 years and under the age of 15 in 2023 compared to only 11.

Such figures enabled the country to declare HIV epidemic in January in January. Last week, Deputy Minister of Health Penioni Ravunawa warned that Fiji could record more than 3,000 new HIV cases by the end of 2025.

“This is a national crisis,” he said. “And it doesn’t slow down.”

The BBC spoke with more than one expert, advocate and front worker about the causes of such a meteoric increase in the number of cases. Many, HIV has spread and the awareness around the stigmatization decreased, more people came to the fore and tested.

At the same time, they said that numerous more were invisible for official figures and that the real scale of the problem was much larger than the record -breaking numbers.

Supporting Fiji’s HIV epidemic is a tendency to increase drug use, unsafe sex, needle sharing and “Bluetoothing”.

Otherwise, this last term, known as the “hot dot”, refers to an application that an intravenous drug user withdraws his blood after a stroke and injected a second person – then he can do the same for one third.

Fiji General Manager Fiji General Manager Volatabu, which does not contain drugs, saw that it was from the first hand. Last May was in one of Suva’s regular walks in the Fiji capital, when he returned to a corner and saw a group of seven or eight people, he offered support and training to drug users on the streets.

“I saw the needle with blood – it was right in front of me,” he remembers. “This young woman already shot and removes the blood – and then you already have other girls, other adults who have already lined up to be shot with this thing.

“This is not just the needles they share, they share their blood.”

Bluetoothing has also been reported in South Africa and Lesotho, two countries with the highest HIV rates in the world. According to both Mrs. Volatabu and Mrs. Naitalla in Fiji, the application has become popular in the last few years.

They explain a reason for the objection, a cheaper higher: more than one person can break down for a single stroke and share among themselves. Another is the comfort of only needing a syringe.

It can be difficult to come in Fiji, where pharmacies demand prescriptions for syringes under the pressure of police and needle-siring programs.

Although it is a challenging acceptance and approval, although there is increasing acceptance and approval for the presentation of such programs that provide cleanly injected programs to drug users in order to reduce the transmission of blood -based blood -induced infections in the extremely religious and conservative country.

Mrs. Volatabu says that needle-siring areas such as needle sharing and bluetoothing, which fuel dangerous applications and fueled dangerous applications such as placement in NGOs to distribute syringes and condoms, are “harsh famine”.

In August 2024, the Ministry of Health and Medical Services (MOH) recognized Bluetooth as one of the driving forces of the country’s increase in HIV cases. Another was Chemsex, which people used – usually methamphetamine – before and during sexual encounters.

In Fiji, unlike other countries in the world, crystal Meth is mainly consumed through intravenous injection.

MOH also found that 223 – about 20% of the 1,093 new cases recorded in the first nine months of 2024 were caused by the use of intravenous drugs.

In the last 15 years, Fiji has become a major Pacific Smuggling Center for Crystal Meth. Most of this stems from the geographical location of the world’s highest wage markets – some of the world’s largest manufacturers – and Australia and New Zealand – the world’s highest wage markets.

In the same period, Meth spilled and spread to local communities and became a crisis that was recently declared as “national emergency”, such as HIV.

And according to the people on the facade lines, the age of users is tend to downward.

“We see more and more of these young people,” says Mrs. Volatabu. “They are young and younger.”

Fiji’s latest national HIV statistics refer to injectable drug use as the most widely known transmission mode, which constitutes 48% of cases. While sexual transmission constitutes 47% of cases, mother-child transmission during pregnancy and birth is stated as the cause of most pediatric cases.

Everyone Talking by the BBC admitted that there was a central factor in the epidemic of lack of education. Mrs. Volatabu and Mrs. Naita both are trying to change it – and Ms. Naitalla says that she fell in favor of “Bluetoothing” as a greater awareness around HIV’s dangers.

More people are tested and are being treated for HIV and leads to more robust data around the crisis scale.

However, there is still a concern that the official case numbers are only afraid of the tip of the iceberg and what may be below the surface.

“An excellent storm is brewing,” he says, José Sousa-Sandos, President of the Pacific Regional Security Center University of Canterbury University, New Zealand University.

“The concern will be at all levels of the society and the government in relation to Fiji’s HIV crisis – not only what happened, but the lack of Fiji’s resources,” the BBC says. “Support Systems – the ability to distribute drugs for nursing, HIV treatment or access drugs – not just there.

“He scare us, people working in the region: There is no way for Fiji to deal with it.”

Following a epidemic in January, the Fiji government tried to improve HIV survey and to increase the ability to address the possible notification of cases.

In a recent report, “a well -coordinated national response is very important in reversing the orbit of the HIV epidemic in Fiji,” he said.

This report also stated that difficulties related to personnel scarcity, communication problems, laboratory equipment and HIV fast test and drug stocking affect screening, diagnosis and treatment.

Data collection is slow, difficult and prone to error, prevents the addition of the EDDi-Fiji’s HIV epidemic and its efforts to understand the effectiveness of the epidemic response.

This leaves many experts, authorities and daily Fiji in the dark. And Mr. Sousa-Sintos still predicts a “avalanche” of future cases.

“What we see right now is the beginning of the ground, but you can’t stop it, because infections are already or have already been already – we can’t see them, and people will not be tested for two to three years,” he says.

He continued: “There is nothing we can do to stop the number of infections previously last year and is happening right now. This is really horrifying.”