Man Nearly Died After Vietnam's Malaria Victory Emptied Medicine Shelves

On July 23, 2026, doctors at Ho Chi Minh City’s Hospital for Tropical Diseases faced an emergency: a 30-year-old man with rapidly worsening severe malaria arrived with no artesunate in southern Vietnam’s hospital supply. Artesunate is the World Health Organization’s sole recommended first-line intravenous treatment for severe malaria. With no doses available, staff arranged an overnight relay flying it 1,056 miles (1,700 km) from Hanoi to avert a likely death. Vietnam’s malaria success—246 cases in 2025 with no deaths and 25 cases so far in early 2026—has driven demand down, leaving hospitals without a national buffer stock mechanism.