Thailand is close to ending Aids as a public health threat.
Today, 95% of people living with HIV in Thailand know their status, 92% of those who know their status are on treatment and 98% of people on treatment are virally suppressed, meaning they can stay healthy and cannot pass on HIV sexually. These figures are well above global averages of 86–89–93. Aids-related deaths are down 71% since 2010 in Thailand, versus about 55% globally.
This progress reflects deliberate policy choices such as integrating HIV services into Universal Health Coverage (UHC) to ensure access to testing and treatment for all; sustaining domestic financing, with more than 90% of the HIV response funded nationally; and advancing rights-based, community-led services that reach the people most in need.
Now is the moment to complete the last mile: to halt new HIV infections and protect future generations. This will require equally deliberate policy choices, including making the full range of HIV prevention options available, ensuring they reach all who need them and expanding trusted, stigma-free, community-led services.
More than 40 years of the HIV response have shown that prevention works best when people have choices that fit their lives. New long-acting tools, including injectable PrEP taken just twice a year, could be game-changing because they make prevention easier and more discreet. This matters especially for young people and for people facing stigma, privacy concerns or challenges with daily pill-taking. But these innovations must be offered alongside the full prevention toolkit, including sexuality education, harm reduction programmes, condoms and oral PrEP.
The task now is to turn new and existing prevention options into scaled-up services that people know about, trust and can use without fear or discrimination.
Thailand has a strong foundation to build on. The 100% Condom Programme helped reduce annual new infections nearly tenfold between 1992 and 2010. More recently, integrating PrEP into UHC has expanded access through trusted community-led services working with government health facilities. Together, these approaches have contributed to a 55% decline in new HIV infections in Thailand since 2010, compared with 40% globally and just 17% across Asia and the Pacific.
Yet progress must accelerate if Thailand is to end AIDS by 2030. The country still records more than 8,000 new HIV infections each year, with about half occurring among young people under 25.
Ending Aids has never been only a medical challenge. It has also always been shaped by inequality. The remaining challenge in Thailand, across Asia-Pacific and beyond is about access, delivery and equity. The core is to ensure that all prevention tools are fully adopted, properly funded and implemented in ways that reach those still being left behind.
The new Global AIDS Strategy 2026–2031 reinforces this urgency, calling for at least 90% of people at risk to have access to effective HIV prevention through integrated packages combining biomedical tools, behavioural interventions, structural measures and community-led services. In Thailand, this commitment is reflected in the HIV Response Sustainability Roadmap, a country-owned approach to protecting progress and closing prevention gaps.
At a time of constrained funding and shifting priorities, the world needs examples that prove success is still possible. Thailand can be one of them, showing that political commitment, sustained investment and practical action can protect progress and accelerate the end of Aids.
Thailand's leadership can also help drive progress across the Asia-Pacific. The region has enormous potential, as it is already central to research, innovation, and the production of affordable medicines. By sharing what works, from sustainable financing to community-led delivery, Thailand can help turn regional strength into a more effective and inclusive HIV response. The path forward is clear -- invest in prevention, protect community-led responses and ensure equitable and sustainable access to the full range of HIV services.
As the world looks ahead to the 2026 UN High-Level Meeting on HIV/Aids, the next phase of the response will require renewed political commitment and decisive action.
Ending Aids as a public health threat by 2030 is within reach in Thailand and across the wider region. But reaching that goal will depend on completing the unfinished work of prevention and ensuring that every person can use the services and choices they need.
Eamonn Murphy is Regional Director for Asia Pacific, Eastern Europe and Central Asia of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/Aids.
