AHF Cambodia distributes 113K LOVE Condoms, urges Phnom Penh residents to “Love Yourself. Love your Partner.”

During the commemoration of the International Condom Day in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Feb. 13, AIDS Healthcare Foundation and its key partners reached over 30,000 people with HIV prevention messages and distributed 113,221 LOVE Condoms.

Organizer of the condom awareness-raising initiative, which included AHF and eight local civil society members, recruited 178 volunteers in an effort to contact most-at-risk groups such as injecting drugs users, commercial sex workers and men who have sex with men (MSM), with messages about proper condom use and HIV prevention.

Guided by the overarching theme of “Love yourself. Love your partner,” the volunteers dressed in red t-shirts and caps with the LOVE Condoms logo imprint, took their message of safer, responsible sex to the markets, factories and universities across the city, distributing free condoms along the way.

In face-to-face conversations and small group discussions, the condom activists engaged people on the streets with questions about HIV prevention. All respondents were rewarded with a strip of four LOVE Condoms, and those who answered the questions correctly also received AHF-branded LOVE Condoms pens and key rings.

Organizations which collaborated with AHF in commemoration of the International Condom Day included, Bandanh Chaktomuk, Cambodia People Living with HIV/AIDS Network, Cambodian Women for Peace and Development, Korsang, Key of Social Health Educational Road, People Health Development Association, Vithey Chivit/Road of Life and Women Organization for Modern Economy and Nursing.

While HIV prevalence among the general population has declined in Cambodia from its peak of 2.1 percent in 1998 to 0.7 percent in 2010, among the high-risk groups such as MSM it still remains high at over 8 percent. Therefore condom advocacy continues to be the cornerstone of prevention in the country’s fight against HIV/AIDS.