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Children and Poverty: Key Facts
- In a $30 trillion global economy, 1.2 billion people- a quarter of the
human race-are living in conditions of almost unimaginable suffering and
want.
- Between 600 million and 700 million children; representing about 40 per
cent of all those in the developing world- are currently struggling to survive
on less than $1 a day.
- Easily preventable diseases (such as pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria
and measles) account for the deaths of nearly eleven million children under
the age of 5 each year.
- Nearly one billion people in the world are illiterate.
- Over 110 million children of school age are not in school.
- Approximately 1.3 billion people lack safe water.
- Over half of the developing world's population (2.6 billion
people) are without access to adequate sanitation.
- If the world were to invest an extra 30 cents out of every $100, all
children would be healthy, well nourished and in primary school.
- Studies in more than 30 countries indicate basic social services receive,
on average, between 12 per cent and 14 per cent of total public spending.
Two thirds of these countries spend more on debt servicing than on basic
social services; several spend three to five times more on debt.
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