The scale of the orphan crisis in Malawi and the rest of sub-Saharan Africa is somewhat masked by the time lag between when parents become infected and when they die. As adults continue to die from AIDS over the next decade, an increasing number of orphans have and will continue to grow up without parental care and love; some of these orphans get the virus from their parents unknowingly. Over the years, many initiatives have been put in place to reverse the suffering and spread of the disease worldwide. The introduction of prevention from mother to child program in 2008 has seen many HIV free children being born.
Recently I came upon an HIV positive AIDS orphan born before this program . The boy takes life prolonging Antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, but often cannot find enough food to sustain his health. With his mother and father already dead of AIDS, he searches for food and clothes to sustain himself often walking 20-kilometers to the nearest trading center in search of part time work. Unable to attend school, this boy’s prospects for the future seem dim.
Since the majority of Malawians live on less than a dollar a day, and this lack of income puts extra pressure on AIDS orphans to contribute financially to the household. In some cases it drives them to the streets to work, beg or seek food and clothes. Thanks to the Malawi Project and the Compassionate Warehouse we provided this boy with clothes, shoes, writing materials and bedding material to (hopefully) ease his suffering. This task formidable, but we do what we can.
Reported by Wilson Tembo