[HIV infection in day-care and school centers].

Today it is known in what ways the transmission of HIV may occur in the child population. Most infected children are the offspring of infected mothers; according to the Study of the European Collaborative Community, only 13% of children of HIV infected mothers are infected. Different organizations all over the world have dictated specific regulations and laws to integrate the HIV infected child into groups of other children. In the Basque Country, the Plan of AIDS Prevention and Control was established in January 1988. This is a working plan involving the Departments of Health and Education of the Basque Government with the following objectives: 1) With the authorization of the family, to inform the director of the center where the child is of the child's situation. 2) To maintain the confidentiality. 3) To educate teaching staff in the adoption of measures designed to prevent the theoretical possibility of HIV infection in the school environment. Annually, a meeting of all schools which have enrolled are are to enroll an HIV (+) child is established with the multidisciplinary team. After seven academic years of experience, 53 infected children have been schooled in private and public centers. The periodic meetings between the schools and multidisciplinary team are very useful in developing the plan. The presence of an HIV (+) child in a school does not present special problems for the dynamics of how the school functions. In our opinion, all programmes for the schooling of HIV (+) children should involve coordination between hospital based pediatricians, educators and the Department of Health and Education.