[Press Kit]

( UNAIDS PRESS RELEASE
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UNDER EMBARGO UNTIL 14.30 GMT
1 December 1999
THE CHILDREN LEFT BEHIND
- UNICEF and UNAIDS Issue A New Report on Global AIDS Orphan Crisis -
New York, 1 December 1999 - Throughout sub-Saharan Africa and around the world, the
damage being wrought by HIV/AIDS has a new face - the millions of children who have been
orphaned by the pandemic, left behind to struggle not only with their personal losses but with the
stigma and discrimination that often accompany AIDS.
In a new report, "Children Orphaned By AIDS: Front-line responses from Eastern and Southern
Africa," the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the Joint United Nations Programme on
HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) say that the number of children orphaned by AIDS is skyrocketing and that
the traditional African extended family is breaking down under the unprecedented burden of the
pandemic.
AIDS orphans are defined as children who, before the age of 15, have lost either their mother or
both parents to AIDS.
"The figures are staggering: By the end of this year the world will have seen 11.2 million children
orphaned by AIDS, 95 per cent of them in sub-Saharan Africa," said Peter Piot, Executive Director
of UNAIDS. "By the end of the year 2000, we estimate that the number of AIDS orphans will rise to
more than 13 million."
"The scale of the orphan crisis is almost unimaginable," said UNICEF Executive Director Carol
Bellamy. "Before AIDS, about 2 per cent of all children in developing countries were orphans. By
1997, the figure had jumped to 7 per cent in many African countries - in some countries the figures
run as high as 11 per cent.
"Worse, the skyrocketing numbers of AIDS orphans is - in addition to the loss of life caused by
AIDS - putting a severe strain on traditional support systems in Africa. The grandparents who in
so many cases are taking care of their orphaned grandchildren have limited resources," Bellamy
pointed out. "They cannot keep this up forever."
In developing countries, AIDS orphans face extreme economic uncertainty and are at higher risk of
malnutrition, illness, abuse and sexual exploitation than children orphaned by other causes, the
report says. Additionally, AIDS orphans must face the stigma and discrimination that so often

shadows the disease. This leaves them socially isolated, and often deprived of basic social
services such as education.