Children of the epidemic – AIDS orphans in Africa

Traditionally, African children who have lost their parents find protection in their extended families, are adopted by aunts, cousins, or other relatives. AIDS is threatening to change all that. In Uganda’s Rakai District, 15,000 to 20,000 abandoned children are living entirely on their own because their extended families do not exist any more: all adults have died of AIDS. According to the records there will be 10 millions AIDS orphans in Africa by the year 2000. On the neglected fields of their deceased parents the children of Rakai harvest an emergency ration for “matoke” (cooking bananas) – nothing else. They have no money for school fees, no livestock, no clean water or proper clothing – no hope and no future. They are aware of the disease. Many of them want to become nuns or catholic priests, just to avoid lethal sex. And yet, the disease may catch up with them, too. Meanwhile, they attempt to survive in depopulated villages.