SA Faces Major Crisis Over Orphans, says SAIRR

The South African Institute for Race Relations (SAIRR) has warned that South Africa’s slow response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic has triggered a time bomb that may leave one in three children orphaned.

SAIRR researcher, Gail Eddy, points out that while the country’s HIV-infection rate may have stabilised, “Estimates show that by 2015, some 5 700 000 or 32 percent of all children in South Africa would have lost one or both parents due to HIV/AIDS.

Eddy says that, "If the status quo is maintained, South Africa will be faced with a major crisis in the future, due to the social and economic consequences of increasing numbers of orphans and child-headed households."

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