The United Nations Children ‘s Emergency Fund ( UNICEF) has warned that in the next six months, more than 400,000 children in South Asia could suffer from the coronavirus also known as COVID-19, with India being the most seriously affected.
As per details, the world predicts that if countries do not take urgent action, 440,000 children will be affected in South Asia over the next six months.
The figures are based on analysis by researchers from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in the recently released Lancet Global Health journal.
During the next six months in India alone, as many as 3,00,000 children could be affected because of the lockdown implemented to curb the spread of the dread virus, UNICEF has said.
UNICEF Regional Director for South Asia, Jean Gough said “We must protect the mothers, the pregnant women and children in South Asia at all cost.
Fighting the pandemic is critical but we cannot lose momentum on the decades of progress we have made in the region to reduce preventable maternal and child deaths.”
“It is crucial that childbirth, child health and nutrition services remain available for families during the time of COVID-19.”
In fact , the United Nations’ world organization, UNICEF reports that such disruptions may lead to potentially catastrophic rises in mother and child deaths.
The study by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, newly published in the Lancet Global Health Journal further said that nearly 95,000 children in Pakistan could suffer severely from coronavirus, 28,000 in Bangladesh, 13,000 in Afghanistan, 4,000 in Nepal, the study suggests.
