And one in five die of diarrhea, malaria or respiratory afflictions. Indeed, disease is proliferating. A three-month outbreak of dengue fever last summer struck about 15,000 children in Phnom Penh and its surrounding provinces, killing some 300. While many Asian countries worry about aging populations, Cambodia seems stuck in another era, where average life expectancy barely exceeds 50 years. In a population of 11 million, at least 140,000 are infected with the virus - an estimate many experts believe understates the incidence by half.
Few specialists doubt Cambodia now has Asia's highest infection rate.
The government has scant resources to fight the problems. Now even that relatively meager lifeline is starting to look shaky. It represents a growing international exasperation with a country that won't help itself. Two of the biggest aid-givers, Germany and the United States, trimmed their allocations after the violent ouster of First Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh in July 1997. But despite dismay over this internecine struggle, which to outsiders seemed fueled entirely by personal ambitions, most of the big donors, including the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, have continued to honor their commitments.