Key Messages

The HIV/AIDS pandemic is unravelling decades of progress for children, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. Gains achieved in health and education through years of investment and development are being lost, not only across wide swaths of Africa, but increasingly across Asia, Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America and the Caribbean.

HIV/AIDS disproportionately affects the young.

By 2004 in sub-Saharan Africa alone, AIDS had killed one or both parents of more than 12 million children still under the age of 15. The total number of children orphaned by HIV/AIDS in Africa is expected to increase significantly, unless access to life-prolonging treatment is rapidly increased.

The population of children orphaned and made vulnerable by AIDS is growing rapidly at the same time as family and community capacities are over-stretched, and the worst is yet to come.

Half of all new infections occur in young people 15-24 years old; most are girls.

Young people’s ability to develop their potential and participate in society is being threatened by the impact of HIV/AIDS on them, their families and their communities.

Last year, an estimated 640,000 children became infected with HIV – the vast majority of them during pregnancy, at birth or through breastfeeding. Most of these infants will die before their fifth birthday.

Few parents and fewer children have access to treatment for AIDS.

UNICEF is seeking a paradigm shift in the response to children and AIDS. However, success in combating the AIDS crisis will depend on global progress in other UNICEF priority areas: immunization and health system strengthening; basic education, especially for girls; early childhood care; and protecting children from violence, exploitation and abuse.

The aim of UNICEF’s work on HIV/AIDS is to support and strengthen the capacities of individuals, families, communities and nations to prevent HIV infection and to manage its impacts and consequences.