After 40 years of entertaining children in 140 countries, the educational kids’ show Sesame Street will hit Nigera for the first time in the fall, using, for one, an HIV-positive character in order to relate to millions of Nigerian kids.

Her name is Kami. She’s big, yellow and sweet, and she’s already been on South Africa’s Sesame Street for about eight years.

UNICEF says that in Nigeria, 1.8 million kids are orphaned by AIDS, just like Kami. In the show the character chats in a child-friendly manner about the loss of her family members and the spread of HIV, without getting into sex.

Of course, you’ve got your off-the-cuff naysayers who believe Kami is a way to normalize homosexuality on TV, even though Kami’s sexuality is completely nonexistent in the show, and she contracted HIV via blood transmission from her folks.

But no matter what you believe, HIV will only be one component of the half-hour show. Sesame Street also hopes to educate millions of Nigerian kids who aren’t enrolled in school, teaching them reading, writing, numbers, and all that good Sesame Street stuff.

Check out the video of Kami with former US President Bill Clinton! She doesn’t seem so threatening to the fabric of moral society to me. Clinton on the other hand kind of creeps me out in this video!

Photo Credit:Sesame Street Workshop