Despite the severity of this situation, many people still think of AIDS

Despite the severity of this situation, many people still think of AIDS as something that affects adults. Some people occasionally think of ‘AIDS babies’ and children who have lost one or both of their parents to AIDS – AIDS orphans – are sometimes in the media. But since HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is commonly transmitted through sex or drug use, people don’t really think of it affecting children. It does, though – and millions of children around the world continue to have their lives damaged by HIV.

In India out of the identified 55,764 AIDS cases 2112 are children. India has the largest number of AIDS orphans and it number is expected to become double in next five years.

There are around 239 million adolescent in India which accounts for 22.8 percent of population as per last Census Report of 2001.The World Health Organisation defines Adolescents as young people aged 10-19 .Adolescents are no longer children ,but not yet adults .They are considered to be most vulnerable group as far as Sexually Transmitted infections (STIs ) is concerned. Rita Panicker, Director of NGO Butterfly informs that around 300,000 children in India are engaged in commercial sex.