PHNOM PENH, April 9 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia on Monday launched a 55-million-U.S.-dollars, three-year program (2018-2020) to fight AIDS and tuberculosis, according to a statement from the Ministry of Economy and Finance.
The program was funded by the Global Fund, the statement said.
Cambodian Economy and Finance Minister Aun Pornmoniroth and Mark Edington, head of the Global Fund's grant management division, jointly unveiled the program, which saw 41 million U.S. dollars be allocated to AIDS fight and the remainder to tuberculosis fight.
"The Global Fund is our most important partner in the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria," Pornmoniroth said during the launching ceremony in Phnom Penh.
The Southeast Asian nation has made remarkable success in combating HIV/AIDS in the last two decades, according to Ly Penhsun, director of the National Center for HIV/AIDS, Dermatology and Social Transmitted Diseases Control.
In his presentation during the Health Ministry's annual congress on March 26, Penhsun said the prevalence rate of HIV infections had decreased to 0.6 percent in 2017 from 1.6 percent in 1998.
He said some 68,678 people are currently living with HIV/AIDS, and 85 percent of them have received antiretroviral drugs.
For tuberculosis, Cambodia remains one of the highest tuberculosis burden countries in the world, with 222 people estimated to be infected per 100,000 in the population in 2016, according to the World Health Organization.