UNICEF: At Least 356 Million Children Live in Extreme Poverty

The United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) warned that 356 million children globally suffered extreme poverty before the COVID-19 pandemic and these estimations are likely to increase.

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"These numbers alone should shock anyone. And the scale and depth of what we know about the financial hardships brought on by the pandemic are only set to make matters far worse. Governments urgently need a children’s recovery plan to prevent countless more children and their families from reaching levels of poverty unseen for many, many years," UNICEF Director of Programmes Sanjay Wijesekera stressed.

UNICEF and the World Bank's latest report reveals that sub-Saharan Africa represents two-thirds of children living in households whose income does not surpass  $1.90 a day or less per person, which is the international measure for extreme poverty. The organization estimates that two out of three extremely poor children in the world live in this region.

South Asia reports the second highest rates of impoverished children with about 18.1
percent of the world's minors living in these conditions.

Moreover, the study confirms that child poverty is more prevalent in countries prone
to conflict since 41.6 percent of children from these countries also live in impoverished households.

Furthermore, the report highlights that almost 20 percent of children under five years old in the developing world live in extreme poverty. Simultaneously, the statistics show that children are more likely to suffer extreme poverty than adults, with a gap of 17.5 percent of children compared to 7.9 percent of adults.