UNICEF's M6.5 Billion Fundraising Campaign to Help AIDS Orphans

The United Nations Children’s Find (UNICEF) next year plans to launch a fundraising campaign aimed at raising M6.5 billion over six years to help AIDS orphans, Peter McDermott, HIV/AIDS adviser for UNICEF, announced on September 23.

 "Our target is to reach 10 million orphans and assist them to get access to schools, have food and meet other needs," McDermott, who was attending a three-day conference on AIDS orphans in Cape Town South Africa, said.

Representatives from UNAIDS and the United Nations World Food Programme and officials from 17 African countries attended the conference. McDermott said UNICEF has been meeting with donors and hopes to launch the fundraising campaign in 2005 to curb the projected increase in the number of AIDS orphans through 2010.

The total number of children throughout the world who have lost one or both parents to AIDS-related causes has reached 15 million, and the number of AIDS orphans in sub-Saharan Africa increased to about 12 million in 2003, according to a joint report by UNAIDS, UNICEF and USAID released on July 13 at the XV International AIDS Conference in Bangkok, Thailand.

The report, titled "Children on the Brink", shows that the number of orphans worldwide is expected to reach 18.4 million by 2010.

24 September 2004