"I Believe that Children Are Our Future..."

Not to be David Downer or anything, but…

The news is not good for the children of the World.

Yesterday, as I was getting ready for work, I heard a story on NPR (or Minnesota Public Radio) which indicated that child poverty in the United States increased to 17% (from, if I remember correctly, 16% last year). This data was issued by the Federal Government, but I cannot find the source anywhere on the web.

What I did find was this report from UNICEF.

Here are the highlights:

More than 1 billion children are denied a healthy and protected upbringing as defined by the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

There are seven basic deprivations, and here is how many children are impacted by each one:

640 million children do not have adequate shelter
500 million children have no access to sanitation
400 million children do not have access to safe water
300 million children lack access to information
270 million children have no access to health care services
140 million children have never been to school
90 million children are severely food-deprived

In the last decade, in 11 of 15 industrialized nations, the proportion of children living in low-income households has increased.

Since 1990, 3.6 million people have died as a result of armed conflict. Half of them have been children.

In addition, children are:

recruited or abducted as soldiers
victims of landmines
forced to witness violence and killing
orphaned by violence
targets of sexual violence

In a typical five year war, the mortality rate of children under five increases 13%.

There are 15 million AIDS orphans worldwide.