HIV/AIDS education

HIV/AIDS is spreading throughout the African continent at a horrific speed with devastating results. Anniseta is one of around 1.7 million children under 15 who have lost one or both their parents to AIDS. As well as losing her parents, Anniseta is also HIV-positive.

Today over 800,000 Ugandans are infected with the HIV virus and AIDS is the leading cause of death amongst adults. Education, as well as medical treatment, is urgently needed. Uganda’s AIDS crisis is complicated by poverty. People on low incomes with limited access to education and health services are less likely to know about HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases and how to prevent it.

Once infected with HIV, poor people can’t afford adequate treatment, and gradually lose their ability to work and generate what little income they had previously been able to.

Anniseta now lives with her grandmother who does her best to provide adequate food and clothing for Anniseta and her 14 year old sister. Anniseta also helps by selling groundnuts. As well as having to pay for food and clothing, Anniseta needs money for her education. “We need money for school uniforms, socks, shoes, pens, school bags and maths sets. And we’ve been told that this year we’ll have to start paying school fees." Anniseta cannot afford the school fees. She is waiting for the time when the school finds out that she has not paid her fees and sends her home. Anniseta is lucky to be able to live with her grandmother. Many children who have lost their parents to AIDS have also become homeless.

Although life for Anniseta is very precarious, she believes she has a responsibility to inform other children of how to avoid contracting HIV/AIDS. Through Save the Children, youth clubs have been set up where children like Anniseta can get together and discuss issues and share their knowledge of HIV/AIDS with other children. By visiting schools and explaining the facts of AIDS, Anniseta believes that other children can avoid becoming infected. “I think it’s a good idea to tell children about AIDS, because then they can tell other children about it. We feel that AIDS has become a serious problem. It kills people, and it makes people miserable. We think that God should decide when you leave this world, not AIDS".

Raising awareness about AIDS and how it is contracted is very important to help eliminate this disease. Save the Children is also helping provide homes to children who have lost their parents to AIDS.

$10 buys 100 bricks in Uganda to build a new shelter for a child-headed family whose parents have died of AIDS.

You can help change a child's life

Call 0800 167 168 or use our secure online donation facility to make your donation now.