World AIDS Day
World AIDS Day 2008.
Monday 1st December marks World AIDS Day.
To mark the day we are highlighting Trócaire's work supporting Cambodian children who have lost their parents though HIV/AIDS or who have contracted the virus from their parents.
AIDS is the most devastating pandemic humankind has ever faced, taking over 25 million lives in the last 25 years. 33 million people are currently living with HIV with 67% of these living in sub-Saharan Africa.
Millions of these people are also affected by the poverty, stigma and discrimination that often accompanies a HIV diagnosis.
View our World AIDS Day Gallery on Flickr
The global response to HIV/AIDS: where are we now?
World AIDS day exhibition at Irish Aid Centre
Support the grandparents of HIV orphans this Christmas
HIV infections are on the increase in East Asia and in 2007 Aids claimed the lives of 390,000 people in Asia.
There are an estimated 170,000 people living with the HIV/AIDS virus in Cambodia. About half of Cambodia's population is aged under 20 and is vulnerable to contracting HIV/AIDS. Of the 10,000 street children in Phnom Pehn , 40% of these children's parents have HIV.
In Cambodia Trócaire is supporting children who have lost their parents though HIV/AIDS or who have contracted the virus from their parents.
One of the greatest tragedies of HIV/AIDS is the number of children who have lost both their parents to the illness and are now being cared for by their grandparents. This heartbreaking situation takes its toll on these older carers emotionally, financially and physically.
One of Trócaire’s ethical gifts this Christmas is 'The gift of support for grandparents’. This gift will help grandparents to provide a happy and secure environment for their grandchildren, earn an income, grow food and access healthcare.
Kimpheuk Tahn, a grandmother living in Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh, has been looking after her two grandchildren since they were born. Her own daughter died over ten years ago and Kimpheuk was left alone, struggling to feed her grandsons. With support from Trócaire Kimpheuk is now able to cope and is sending her boys to school. "I worry about my boys but now I make sure they go to school and get an education so they can look after themselves in the future"
Trócaire’s Cambodia partners helping children orphaned through HIV/AIDS.
Trócaire's partner organisations began supporting orphans after the adults they were caring for kept asking "what will happen to my children when I die?"
The Little Folks Project helps children whose parents have died of HIV. It helps guardians to send their children to school for at least six years and still have enough food and other basic necessities of life. It also provides psychological and emotional support, even more than financial assistance.
Since October 2001, the project has helped hundreds of children to attend school. There are currently approximately 600 children in the Little Folks project supported by Trócaire.
Trócaire also helps children with HIV by providing healthcare, education, medical care and other social services.
The Little Sprouts programme supported by Trócaire provides homecare, residential care, educational support and other social services to children infected with HIV in order to shelter them from the potentially devastating effects that HIV/AIDS can have on their life chances.
Little Sprouts also operates an expanding PMCT (Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission) programme that ensures infected mothers deliver in hospitals, that mother and baby receive the necessary medication and that the infants receive infant formula for 10 months.
Little Sprouts now serves 276 children, including 104 children living in group homes, and 172 children living in home based care.
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