Like many in Africa, the country of Uganda has been hit hard by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Though infection rates have decreased in recent years, the effects of this brutal disease are still being felt nationwide. In addition, the ongoing 20 year war between the Lord’s Resistance Army and the Ugandan Government has resulted in thousands of children forced to serve as LRA soldiers, and nearly 2 million Ugandans forced out of their villages and into displacement camps. As a result, political and economic instability combined with the harsh psychological effects of war have produced a crippling amount of poverty for the Ugandan people.

While the war has had devastating consequences nationwide, the villags of Namagera and Kamuli, along with the rest of the country, is fighting a greater war against the devastations caused by HIV/AIDS. In these villages, thousands of children have lost their parents to AIDS, and many women have lost their husbands. These children and widows have been left vulnerable to further devastations of poverty and disease as they struggle to obtain basic needs such as adequate sources of income, food, and education.