We recommend that school education for children should be a priority even when the harsh economic realities in their families force parents to send them to work outside the home.

Background: HIV/AIDS has contributed to increasing orphans and vulnerable children in Nigeria. A measure of vulner- ability is household hunger. Objective: To assess level of household hunger and associated factors among OVC households in Lagos State. Methods: A cross-sectional survey of 1300 OVC households in 5 selected Local Government Areas. The LGAs were select- ed using the Household Vulnerability Assessment index. Data collection was by personal interview of households’ heads/ caregivers using a structured questionnaire capturing socio-demographic, household economic profile and food-related variables. A multivariate logit model was fitted to identify independent predictors of household hunger after adjusting for confounding variables. Results: The population density was 5.1 and 52.8% were females. A larger proportion of females (84.6%) than males (78.3%) reported that they had no food to eat in the last four weeks prior the survey. Poor household economic status (OR=1.41, CI: 1.03-1.92), age and marital status of caregiver were independent predictors of household hunger. The odds of hunger increased with caregiver’s age; higher in households headed by never married (OR=3.99, CI: 1.15-13.89) and di- vorced/separated caregivers (OR=2.39, CI: 1.11-5.12). Conclusion: OVC households experienced severe hunger. Household economic strengthening would be useful strategy to mitigate the nutrition challenges of OVC in Lagos state. Keywords: Orphans; vulnerable; children; households food security; caregivers; economy; Nigeria.