United Nations Children's Fund (New York)
4 June 2004
press release
New York — While leaders of the world's richest countries gaather on Sea Island, Georgia in the US for the G8 Summit, UNICEF calls on them to remember the plight of children in many of the world's poorest countries.
Over the course of their three day meeting from June 8-10:
- 7,500 young children will die of malaria
- A child will be orphaned by AIDS every 14 seconds
- 65 million girls will be denied schooling, as they are throughout the year
- more than 160 million will be malnourished
- 13,000 children will die from diarrhoea - a result of poor water and sanitation.
Last year G8 leaders reiterated their commitment to the Millennium Development Goals--a series of time-bound, quantifiable development targets. But, the world is not advancing fast enough toward one of the most critical of these goals: the survival of the world's poorest children. A shameful 11 million children under the age of five continue to die each year. Six million of these deaths result from preventable and treatable illnesses such as malaria, diarrhoea, pneumonia and measles.
Over the last decade, the gap in child death rates between the richest and poorest regions of the world has increased. In industrialized countries, the chance that a child will die before the age of five is 1 in 100. In less-developed countries, that chance is nine times higher. And, in the world's 49 Least Developed Countries, 16 out of 100 children will not make it to the age of five. Sub-Saharan Africa, with only 10 percent of the world's population, accounts for 42 per cent of all deaths of children under the age of five.
"If we are to meet the Millennium Development Goal aiming to reduce child mortality by two-thirds- the world needs to act with greater deliberation and urgency," said Carol Bellamy, Executive Director of UNICEF. "UNICEF is working on the ground in 158 countries to save young lives. The G8 countries have the power to drive child mortality rates down. UNICEF urges them to use it."
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