Epidemic claims thousands of parents
The mainland has an estimated 140,000 children who have lost at least one parent to Aids, but government efforts to give them financial assistance are falling short, a UN agency said yesterday.
The estimate, announced publicly for the first time by the mainland office of Unicef, includes children who have lost one or both parents to Aids - in line with the international definition of an Aids orphan.
In 2005, quoting figures provided by the China Disease Control Centre, state media reported that 76,000 children on the mainland had lost at least one parent to Aids and projected this figure could rise to 260,000 by 2010.
Zhang Lei , a consultant at the Unicef office for China, said half a million children on the mainland were affected by Aids, meaning they were orphaned, infected themselves, or living in households in which at least one parent was infected.
Ken Legins, the chief of HIV/Aids for Unicef China, said its figures were unofficial estimates compiled with institutions the agency worked with on the mainland.