Facts & Challenges

Background

One of the most difficult challenges of the HIV epidemic is supporting the growing number of children orphaned and made vulnerable by AIDS.

AIDS will leave more than 25 million children orphaned in sub-Saharan Africa by 2010. Despite their extraordinary resilience, AIDS orphans and vulnerable children will have little chance of becoming productive future citizens without adequate support. Their course—as well as the economic and political future of countries where these children live—will be determined by our collective ability to address this crisis now.

Orphans and vulnerable children are often cared for by relatives or guardians already overburdened by poverty and ill-equipped financially or emotionally to provide support.

Such children, especially girls, frequently drop out of school to care for sick parents, go to work to replace the income their parents can no longer generate, or are forced to stay at home to take care of siblings.

Other children live in child-headed households—where a child under the age of 18, some as young as 8 years old—takes on responsibilities usually carried out by parents, including the care of other children.

Orphans are only one group of children made vulnerable by AIDS. Millions of other children live with ill relatives or are infected themselves. Without the protection of their parents or the structure of a family, orphans and vulnerable children are likely to be out of school, suffer from abuse and discrimination, and forced into exploitative work in order to survive.

Where We Are Today

Many people, organizations, and governments have invested time, money, and energy to address this issue. However, much of the funding and policy efforts have been driven from the top-down, never quite reaching the communities that shoulder the responsibility for raising these children. Funding and programming is often erratic and fragmented despite best intentions. Measures of success are often determined by counting numbers of children enrolled in short-term relief programs rather than programs aimed at developing long-term, local solutions that strengthen existing services and networks.

At the community level, many small organizations offer fragmented support. Some may offer school lunches to improve nutrition, or financial support for school supplies or uniforms. Others may provide livelihoods training or apprenticeship programs; and some may offer drama and music. Few consider or recognize the importance of comprehensive approaches that address the broad needs of children.

Even fewer address the fact that these children themselves are particularly vulnerable to HIV. Weak infrastructure, limited resources, and meager strategic, management, or technical training leave community-based organizations without the range of skills, resources, and networks they need to comprehensively care for these children over the long term.

Bantwana supports the comprehensive needs of orphans and vulnerable children by building the management, technical, and strategic skills of groups and individuals supporting these children.