Cambodia

Supporting orphans and vulnerable children

Although the rate of new HIV infections in Cambodia is now dropping, it still has the highest prevalence in Asia and the number of children orphaned as a result of the disease stands at 70,000 and growing. Children made vulnerable by HIV and AIDS face many hardships, including increased poverty, risk of exploitation, malnutrition, loss of family and identity, loss of healthcare, vagrancy, and fewer opportunities for education.

This is a community driven programme helping children affected by HIV and AIDS by providing food parcels, transport for medical care, access to education and individual counselling and advice. The best community infrastructure to deliver these services was via Buddhist pagodas, whose monks were highly respected in society and well placed to provide support and break down stigma. The community pagoda has now become a rallying point around which support services are planned and delivered.

The programme has grown rapidly from reaching 420 children, to 3,500 children and their families. It has developed a referral network of clinics, schools, and village chiefs to ensure that no child within the programme goes hungry, lacks medical treatment or is denied access to school.

Attendance rates for secondary school children within the programme are 87per cent compared with a national average of 24 per cent.

The government of Cambodia has adopted the programme as a model of best practice and successfully secured over $1 million from the Global Fund for TB, AIDS & Malaria to replicate this work tenfold over the next five years.