“4.9 million children under the age of 5 died in 2024, down from 13 million in 1990,” reports The Doomslayer.
Unicef explains:
Since 1990, the world has made remarkable progress: the under five mortality rate has fallen by about 60 per cent, and neonatal mortality by 45 per cent, saving millions of young lives. These gains reflect decades of investment in immunization, essential health services, newborn care, nutrition support and the integrated management of childhood illnesses.
However, this momentum is slowing. While mortality levels today are far lower than in past decades, the current rate of decline means that 27.3 million under five deaths are projected between 2025 and 2030 — nearly 13 million of which will occur in the neonatal period. These deaths remain concentrated in the same regions that continue to face the steepest barriers to quality health services: sub Saharan Africa and Southern Asia….
Preventable infectious diseases continue to take millions of young lives. For children aged 1–59 months, pneumonia, diarrhoea and malaria remain leading killers, often intensified by malnutrition. For the first time, the report estimates deaths directly caused by severe acute malnutrition (SAM), finding that more than 100,000 children aged 1-59 months died from it in 2024.
“The number of children living in extreme poverty fell to a record low of 412 million in 2024, down from 507 million a decade earlier,” reports The Doomslayer. The percentage of children living in poverty has never been lower in human history.
Global life expectancy and income are at an all-time high.
Child labor has fallen sharply.
