Some 270,000 children have lost one or both parents to AIDS-linked illnesses and the devastation wrought by the 1994 genocide has given Rwanda the highest number of child-headed households on the continent.

HIV/AIDS continues to threaten the world’s children as never before, contributing to increasing child mortality and morbidity in regions with high prevalence. Although most people living with HIV are adults, children under five account for one in six global AIDS-related deaths, and one in seven new global infections. A child dies of an AIDS-related illness every minute of every day, and a young person contracts HIV every 15 seconds.