On the last week of the year 2006, Santa knocked at the door of 1 444 HIV positive kids in 23 regions of Ukraine. For the fourth year in a row Elena Franchuk ANTIAIDS Foundation and All-Ukrainian network of people living with HIV purchase, pack and send new year’s presents to the smallest HIV positive Ukrainians. Comparing to the last year the number of HIV positive children has doubled. The budget of the project in 2006 has come to almost 16 thousands USD.

Unfortunately, the number of kids with HIV/AIDS is growing every year – in our country and in our New Year project. In 2003  Elena Franchuk ANTIAIDS Foundation and All-Ukrainian network of people living with HIV organized the New Year party in Kiev for 55 HIV-positive children and their parents. In one year time in Kiev, Odessa, Donetsk, Cherkassy and Chernigov, 211 kids received presents and visited kid’s parties. In December 2005 we prepared and sent New Year presents for 854 children from 15 cities of Ukraine. This year 1 444 kids received our presents…

Toys, milk formula “Bebi” and dry snacks “Start” of different kinds, dry fruits, and a box with sweets – perhaps it’s not a surprise for our kids. But these kids are special. They are often deprived of the simplest things. A lot of them have only grandparents; many parents lost their job because of their HIV status. Some of the children spent in hospitals almost all their childhood.  For many of them it will be the only Christmas present…

For the first time in four years, we asked volunteers’ assistance in packing presents. We would like to thank kindly all people, who helped us! Moreover, we would like to thank our partners, who gave us special discounts. First of all, these are “Serialiya Ukraine” and “Europroduct”, which gave us huge discounts on their products, and, of course, “Plast Ukraine” – this company provided us with plastic bags for presents for free (!). It is certainly not the question of money. If we can give a hand to those in need, our country has a chance to get well.