The HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control Department has warned of a high rate of HIV infections through unsafe sex in Vietnam.

At a preventive medicine conference in the southeastern province of Dong Nai on March 27, the department said since the country’s first HIV carrier was detected in 1990, more than 210,000 people have been tested positive to HIV, over 63,000 of them died.

HIV/AIDS patients are now recorded in 98 percent of districts and 79 percent of communes and wards across the country.

Almost half of the number of new HIV carriers found in 2012 alone was reportedly sexually transmitted.

Meanwhile, the rate of HIV transmission among drug users fell from 13.4 percent to 11.6 percent in 2012, the department reported.

According to the Ministry of Heath, the number of newly-detected cases and transmission rate among high-risk groups reduced in 2012. However, the disease is now devastating new communes and wards.

The department said unsafe sex and difficult access to medical services in mountainous areas are main reasons behind the rise in the disease in these areas.

The Ministry of Health affirmed it will promote the dissemination of information to change people’s behavior and raise public awareness of leading a healthier life to stop the spread of the disease.