These days, everyone is trying to go viral, but when it comes to herpes, there’s still a lot of associated shame and depression. A recent ad campaign by the New Zealand Herpes Foundation (NZHF) is calling for the destigmatization of the condition with a clever and humorous mission: to make New Zealand the “best place” to have herpes.
The visually rich ad campaign, which launched in October of last year and won a Grand Prix for Good award at the 2025 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, presents an irreverent solution to fix New Zealand’s “national pride.” Citing devastating trends like the rising price of pies and the drop in polls ranking New Zealanders as having the sexiest accent, the multi-media campaign suggests something new to be proud of: herpes. Retro visuals like postcards and posters, all evoking a sense of yesteryear travel imagery, wrap around a dedicated website that offers a five-part destigmatization course with short informational videos about the virus. The campaign employs filmstock and Viewfinder-esque tableaux to complete the picture of nostalgic vacation ephemera.
“Once upon a time, the world wanted to be New Zealand,” campaign spokesman and rugby union coach Sir Graham William Henry asserts in one of the videos, seated in a classic schoolroom complete with chalkboard and a fritzing A/V setup in the background. “But now look at us.”
The vintage-inspired graphics depict a sampling of the country’s breathtaking natural landmarks as well as a host of national celebrities like professional boxer Mea Motu, comedian Angella Dravid, Real Housewives of Auckland’s Champagne Lady Anne Batley-Burton, and of course, sheep. (The woolly ungulates currently outnumber the human population of New Zealand by roughly 4-to-1, which is “embarrassingly low,” Henry notes.)
According to the NZHF, 26.8% of women and 17.3% of men will have genital herpes by age 38 in New Zealand. That is a small fraction of the estimated 3.7 billion people under age 50 (67% of the world population) who have the HSV-1 infection globally and an estimated 491 million people aged 15 to 49 who have genital herpes infection, according to World Health Organization statistics. (HSV-1 typically causes oral herpes, but can manifest genitally as well.)
Despite the preponderance of the virus, and the reality that a large percentage of those infected lead symptom-free and ordinary lives, NZHF has tracked its significant impact on mental health.
“Thirty percent of all Kiwis diagnosed with the herpes virus experience depressive or suicidal thoughts,” said Sir Ashley Bloomfield, New Zealand’s former chief executive of the Ministry of Health, says as part of the campaign. “This is a problem we can solve, which is pretty rare these days.”
“Let’s make New Zealand the best place in the world to have herpes,” Bloomfield declares. Talk about viral marketing!
