United Press International - Thursday, 13 July 2000
Ed Susman, UPI Science News

Hardest hit will be the nations of Rwanda, Botswana. Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and the Central African Republic.

"AIDS is creating orphans at a rate unrivaled in world history," said Susan Hunter, co-author of the report, "Children on the Brink 2000," released Thursday at the 13th International AIDS Conference in Durban, South Africa. Hunter said 70 percent of the "orphans" will lose parents due to AIDS.

Legal definitions of "orphans" differ in Africa, but generally include children who have lost either their mother, their father or both parents, she said.

Hunter said that already in five African countries one-fifth to one-third of children under age 15 have lost at least one parent; by the year 2010, 30 percent of these children will be defined as orphans in six countries. "The long-term chronic problems associated with this many orphans will extend through 2030," she said.

Some of the problems that have to be addressed, include redefining inheritance laws, researchers said. Sandy Thurman, director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy, said that in some areas of Africa when a man dies, his wife and children do not inherit, but his brothers will receive his land and possessions. That deprives a devastated family of not only the breadwinner but also of a home, she said. The wife and family are then dependent on the brother for support and that can lead to abuse.

She cited one Ugandan woman, orphaned as a teenager who was raised in a relative's household where she suffered sexual abuse. Now, a 20-year-old college student, the woman has learned that she is HIV-infected. Thurman said that is a typical scenario because these women and children are vulnerable and without resources.

"Girls are much more likely to become caregivers to their siblings and to ill parents, and girls often fall to the end of the line in educational opportunity," she said. "The gains women and girls have made in education are being wiped out by this epidemic."

Thurman said one possible solution is microfinance of cottage industry aimed at caregivers of the orphans. "There is a grandmother in Uganda who lost 11 of 12 adult children to AIDS. She is caring for 35 grandchildren," Thurman said.

With help from loans from community institutions supported by U.S. government funding, the woman was able to purchase pig and chicken breeding stock and has created a great enough income to send 15 of the grandchildren to school and to get treatment for five other children who are HIV-infected. She said the woman has taken out and repaid five loans; the repayment rate of women in her neighborhood who have taken similar loans exceeds 98 percent. "Citicorp should have such a good repayment rate," she said.

Thurman said the United States has earmarked $24 million for helping AIDS "orphans." "It's more than any other country is donating for this purpose," she said. "But it's not enough."

She said that in Lusaka, the capital of Zambia, there are 100,000 orphans living on the streets. The city has a total population of about 1 million. "I went out at night to look at the situation and I was surrounded by this sea of children," Thurman said. "It is an appalling situation. It was an unbelievable experience. They have developed their own little social networks with 10-year-olds taking care of younger children, not necessarily their own brother or sisters, and living in drainage ditches."

Yet, she said, the children fight to attend schools so they can learn to read and write, but the schools in Lusaka can only care for 900 children a day, and can feed the lucky 900 just one meal a day. "These children thirst for education," she said because they know it is their way out of their homeless life.

John Williamson, a co-author of the USAID report, said that keys to solving the orphan crisis include strengthening the capacity of families to cope with problems of taking care of their relatives' survivors with economic and emotional support and mobilizing community-based services.
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