Tunis/Tunisia — Minister of Family, Women, Children and the Elderly Amel Belhaj Moussa, Wednesday, presented the 2022 National Report on the Situation of Children in Tunisia on the theme of « Childhood in Rural Areas.»

This report was based on statistics relating to the evolution of services made available to children across all governorates in 2022 and comparing them with services offered in 2020 and 2021, without taking into account inequalities between cities and urban, rural and semi-rural areas.

The Family Minister pointed out that her department is committed to provide preschool education to all and consolidate public kindergartens, adding that the contribution of the public sector has increased within one single year from 6% to 7.5% in 2023 across all governorates.

According to her, 10,000 children benefited from the «Our Kindergarten in Our Neighborhood» programme in 2021, while 20,000 children benefited from the same programme in 2022.

The report shows that the healthcare system faces several challenges, restricting children's access in rural areas to healthcare services, given the discrepancies in the distribution of doctors, children's services and the number of beds in local hospitals.

Pediatric services are only available in 54 hospitals out of a total of 139 regional and local hospitals, a rate of 38%, while the number of doctors in Greater Tunis stands at 374, in the northwest (189) and only 162 doctors in the southeast, according to the same report.