6-year-old Boy Lives Alone, China

Ah Long is a 6-year-old boy from China who has lost his parents to AIDS. He was born with HIV and even his 84-year-old grandmother doesn't want to live with him because she is afraid of getting sick. He lives in his parents’ shack in Guangxi Province, China, and receives monthly 70 yuan (about $10.50) from the government. Other villagers are also afraid of HIV and don't help the boy at all. His only friend is his dog.
Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a lentivirus (a member of the retrovirus family) that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in humans in which the immune system begins to fail, leading to life-threatening opportunistic infections. Infection with HIV occurs by the transfer of blood, semen, vaginal fluid, pre-ejaculate, or breast milk. Within these bodily fluids, HIV is present as both free virus particles and virus within infected immune cells. The four major routes of transmission are unsafe sex, contaminated needles, breast milk, and transmission from an infected mother to her baby at birth (perinatal transmission). Screening of blood products for HIV has largely eliminated transmission through blood transfusions or infected blood products in the developed world.