A new report by the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) has showed remarkable statistics about how the world's children are now at great risk.
The report shows that more than 640 million children don't have sufficient shelter, while 140 million have never been to school. It also shows 400 million children do not have safe water to drink and 500 million live without basic sanitation. Another 90 million children starve.
The 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child asked countries to help give children a healthy and protected up bringing however violence, aids and poverty are still at their worst. Nearly one in six children suffers from severe hunger and one in seven has no healthcare.
Carol Bellamy, executive director of Unicef, indicated that the main cause of the great risk is wars. Over 20 million children are forced from their homes due to fighting and 3.6 million, half of which are children, have died in such conflicts although a much higher number of children have died from indirect causes of the wars.
However, even though wars are a great cause it is not the only one. Over 30,000 children died last year which would have been prevented if they had adequate healthcare. Another half a million children under the age of 15 died last year and some 2.1 million children across the world are living with HIV. Fifteen million children have lost a parent to Aids, while 80 percent of who live in sub-Saharan Africa.
Carol Bellamy and the Unicef agree that the answer is simple. Over the last year the world's nations have spent 712,000,000eu on weapons, whereas only 52 billion eu is needed to reach status quo.
Currently the United States spends over $400 billion a year on military equipment and $200 billion is currently going towards the war in Iraq.
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Gary is a political writer for Political News and Comments
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