What percentage of children loses at least one close person to death
before the he or she graduates from high school.  Please explain and
give your sources.

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 03 Nov 2005 13:27 PST

Can you tell us how you define "close person?" Would a friend count,
or a favorite teacher?

close person may be the persons in his<her> extended family

If you would consider a "close person" as being one of the parents the
answer to the question would most surely be something like this (If
that close person is anyone from the extended family ... I don`t think
you will ever find the answer since a person close to a child could
be: a cousin,, an uncle, and so on... just think about it, everybody
is someone`s relative):

Some 2001 World Orphanage Statistics
(http://bethel.jesuswork.org/OrphanageResources/html/orphanagestatistics.html)
mention that:

12% of all children in Sub-Saharan Africa were orphans,
6.5% in Asia were orphans
5% in Latin America and the Caribbean. 

As you might notice there are no figures from other parts of the
world. And, of course, the percentage figures are 4 years old.

Most statistics regarding this subject are based on health issues
(AIDS/HIV deaths)...
Instead of statistics you might find easier data about the odds of
losing a close person. It`s all too complex though because of social,
environmental etc factors.