Zim has most orphans - Unicef
2006-12-06 20:28
Special Report
Riot police in Zimbabwe have disrupted a Valentine's Day peace march, scattering women demonstrators.
A dusty road leads to the village of Wedza, where veterans of Zimbabwe's liberation war eke out a meagre living on their farm cooperative, which after a promising start now brings only despair.
Harare - Zimbabwe has the highest percentage of orphaned children in the world, said Unicef.
The United Nations Children's' Fund (Unicef) said on Tuesday that 1.6 million of Zimbabwe's children, or one in four, were orphaned, in most cases because of HIV/Aids. The orphans represented 13% of Zimbabwe's population of about 12 million.
"HIV and Aids have dramatically increased children's vulnerability in recent years to the point where Zimbabwe now has the highest percentage of children who are orphans in the world," said Unicef's country representative Festo Kavishe.
The troubled southern African nation also has the world's highest official inflation - 1 070 - and the fastest shrinking economy outside a war zone.
Last year alone, about 130 000 children lost one or both parents to Aids related illnesses, said Kavishe.
The UN children's agency this week began disbursing $6m donated by Sweden for orphan support programs.
Many deaths go unreported
Health authorities estimate about 3 500 Zimbabweans die every week from conditions linked to HIV/Aids infection - more than the deaths in Sudan's strife and famine torn Darfur province.
Many deaths go unreported in a nation where infection still carries a stigma and antiretroviral treatment is either unavailable or unaffordable to most of the 20% of the population estimated to be infected.
Doctors say though new infection rates were dropping because of successful awareness campaigns, deepening poverty has hastened the death rate.
Regular antibiotics are out of the reach of many and in short supply in the worst economic crisis since independence in 1980, blamed largely on disruptions in the agriculture based economy since the often violent seizures of thousands of white-owned commercial farms began in 2000.
- AP