Future issues affecting frontline service delivery to the population of children and families at risk of HIV infection include education and prevention, recruitment and respite care, permanency planning and adoption, and professional survival. Equipping child welfare agencies with AIDS and HIV prevention information must be a priority. Recruitment of caregivers for children as well as provision of respite care to biological families are a primary function of service agencies; two demonstration programs are described. Children with HIV infection pose a challenge to adoption programs and permanency planning. The need for a continuum of creative care programs that can intervene at various stages of the child's illness require unprecedented cooperation between child welfare services and other systems that serve children and families. A comprehensive system of services will result from individual, organizational, and community advocacy. Some goals of this effort should be to encourage Federal, State, and local agencies to work collaboratively on the development of family-based, coordinated systems of care for children with AIDS; encourage exploration of every possibility of recruiting foster homes for children with AIDS; and develop prevention programs in settings other than schools for hard to reach adolescent groups including runaways, drug abusers, minorities, and street youths. 20 references