By 2003 15 million children under 18 had been orphaned by HIV/AIDS worldwide.

About 12 million of these live in sub-Saharan Africa, and it is expected that this number will rise to more than 18 million by 2010.

Most of the AIDS orphans who live outside of Africa live in Asia, where the total number of orphans - orphaned for all reasons - exceeds 87 million.

There is insufficient information in Asia to provide figures for the number of AIDS orphans in individual countries.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the number of orphans in some countries exceeds 500,000, and, in some countries, children who have been orphaned by AIDS comprise half or more of all orphans nationally.

The age of orphans is fairly consistent across countries - about 15% are 0-4 years old, 35% are 5-9 years old, and 50% are 10-14 years old.

Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, traditional systems take care of children who lose their parents. But the onslaught of HIV erodes traditional practise, overloading its caring capacity with sheer numbers and deepening poverty due to loss of labour and the high cost of medical treatment and funerals.