[Street children and AIDS in Haiti]

This study is a qualitative inquiry KAP about sexuality, and adoption and preservation of safe sexual behaviors, among the children of the street in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Three groups of participating children of the street were observed in Port-au-Prince for three months, during June through August 1991. The information was collected with the use of pre-tested charts for each theme chosen. Then, individual interviews were conducted with leaders identified among the educators and children of the street. One of the main goals of Aids educational programs of street children should be to make them believe in the existence of the disease, and the real risk it poses for death. The strategies that we will use to convince them should deal with the different social, psychological, economical, and environmental factors that characterized the children as follows: 1) their adherence to a peer group and the relationship of power between the older and younger children; 2) the fundamental importance of money in their life, and that all relationships that they have are based on the capacity of people to give them something, such as money; 3) the role of their social appearance and their need to behave like other children for even one day; 4) their low self-esteem; 5) their feeling of powerlessness and resignation related to their living conditions; 6) the influence of the street culture; and 7) their understanding of sexuality as an immediate pleasure.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)