UNICEF Cameroon celebrates the birth of the first babies of 2025

Yaoundé, January 2, 2025 – UNICEF Cameroon is pleased to announce the birth of the first babies of 2025, including Kemal, Ange Noëlla, Abdoul Aziz, Emmanuel, the Sonkoue triplets, and thousands of others across the country. This symbolic moment highlights the importance of giving every child a better start in life so they can develop optimally and reach their full potential.

Cameroon, where nearly half of the population consists of children and adolescents, faces significant challenges in child health and well-being. Nearly 6 million children do not have their rights fully guaranteed, despite the ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1993. In 2025, nearly 3.4 million people, including 1.9 million children, will need humanitarian aid due to humanitarian crises and the impacts of climate change.

UNICEF Cameroon calls for mobilization to ensure every child has a good start in life. This includes:

• Birth Registration: Ensuring every child is registered at birth, guaranteeing a legal identity and access to health services. Currently, only 62% of young children under five are registered at birth.
• Vaccination Coverage: Ensuring every child receives the necessary vaccines for protection against preventable diseases. In 2024, 3 million children did not have a complete vaccination schedule.
• Strengthening Health Infrastructure: Improving health infrastructure and services to ensure every birth is registered and every child has access to necessary care. Only 69% of births are attended by qualified personnel.
• Nutrition and Access to Water: Encouraging exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of life and continuing it up to two years or more, with appropriate complementary feeding. Combating malnutrition, which affects 29% of children, and improving access to drinking water, especially in rural areas where only 75% of households have access to improved drinking water sources.
• Education and Protection: Promoting access to education and protecting children from harmful labor and forced marriage. In 2024, 40% of children aged 5 to 17 were engaged in work harmful to their health and development.
• Climate Change: Addressing the effects of climate change that exacerbate children's vulnerabilities. Droughts, floods, and other climate disruptions deteriorate livelihoods and increase demand on basic social services, compromising the realization of children's fundamental rights.

Kemal, Ange Noëlla, Abdoul Aziz, Emmanuel, and the Sonkoue triplets will receive their birth certificates and first vaccines before leaving the maternity ward, thanks to the interoperability approach promoted by UNICEF. This innovative approach coordinates civil registration and health facilities to facilitate birth registration and vaccine administration. By integrating these services, UNICEF ensures that every child has a legal identity from birth and quickly accesses essential health care.

"Every birth is a promise of a better future. By celebrating the arrival of the first babies of 2025, we reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that every child in Cameroon has access to the health care, education, and protection needed to thrive fully. Together, we can turn every challenge into an opportunity and offer every child a start in life as bright as these newborns," said Nadine Perrault, UNICEF Representative in Cameroon.

The year 2025 also marks the 30th anniversary of UNICEF's presence in Cameroon. Throughout the year, UNICEF and its partners will organize events and make statements to celebrate these thirty years of protecting children from conflict, disease, and exclusion, and advocating for their right to survival, health, and education.