In a grim assessment of the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on children, the UN has said the looming global recession resulting from the outbreak could cause hundreds of thousands of additional child deaths this year, effectively reversing recent gains in reducing infant mortality, and push millions of children into extreme poverty.
It said an estimated 42-66 million children could fall intoextreme poverty as a result of the crisis this year, adding to the estimated386 million million children already in extreme poverty in 2019. “Children arenot the face of this pandemic. But they risk being among its biggest victims.While they have thankfully been largely spared from the direct health effectsof COVID-19 – at least to date – the crisis is having a profound effect ontheir wellbeing,” a new ‘Policy Brief: The impact of COVID-19 on children’released Thursday by the United Nations said.
On the threats to child survival and health, the policybrief said “economic hardship experienced by families as a result of the globaleconomic downturn could result in a hundreds of thousands of additional childdeaths in 2020, reversing the last 2 to 3 years of progress in reducing infantmortality within a single year.”
The brief said that there are three main channels throughwhich children are affected by this crisis – infection with the virus itself;the immediate socioeconomic impacts of measures to stop transmission of thevirus and end the pandemic; and the potential longer-term effects of delayedimplementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.