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	'Girls have less food to eat'. Hungry and out of school in South Sudan by Plan International, WFP, agencies   Sep. 2022   'Girls have less food to eat'. Hungry and out of school in South Sudan, by Susan Martinez. (Plan International, agencies)   Rumbek, South Sudan - “There are times when I feel so hungry that I think going to school would be a waste,” says 15-year-old Martha, as she packs her maths textbook into her school bag when the bell sounds for recess. “Some days I stay at home,” she admits.   On a normal day, her primary school in Rumbek in South Sudan’s Lakes State welcomes thousands of children. The concrete classrooms are usually packed with pupils in matching brown and bright purple uniforms.   However, lately, fewer children have been arriving each day. Many, especially girls, are staying at home instead as the country struggles to cope with rising hunger levels. Some are urged to help as their parents go out in search of food, while others eat less so the men and boys in the family get more of what little there is.   South Sudan, the world’s youngest country, has faced multiple hunger crises throughout its 11 years of independence. Currently, about 7.7 million people, or 63 percent of the population, face acute food insecurity.   The crisis is due to a combination of factors including the effects of COVID-19, years of climatic shocks (floods, dry spells, and droughts), and conflict, which is forcing families to flee their homes. This has left the nation ranked among the world’s hungriest countries.   This year, the problem is exacerbated by critical aid funding shortages, in part due to rising global food prices because of the war in Ukraine - shortages that have forced NGOs to cut back food distributions and school meal programmes.   Ukraine is a major exporter of grain, wheat, corn and sunflower oil, but as Russia’s invasion blocked shipments, global food supplies dwindled and prices rose. Although a deal was recently reached to unblock some ports, the global effects of the shortages are already being felt.   “Children are the ones suffering the most in this crisis, mainly girls,” explains Mary Nyanagok, a gender and protection officer for NGO Plan International, which provides food assistance for tens of thousands of people in South Sudan. “With more than half of the population facing high risk of acute food insecurity, we need to act fast before it is too late.”   When food is scarce, girls often eat less and eat last, the NGO says. Women and girls account for 70 percent of the world’s hungry. And as families and communities come under strain, girls are more likely than boys to be taken out of school, and will be at risk for early and forced marriage, gender-based violence (GBV), sexual exploitation and unwanted pregnancy.   Martha, who is the oldest of seven children, wants to be a doctor. But even her primary schooling is being impacted.   “My father sometimes asks me to stay at home and help him look for food,” she says, trying to remember the last time she didn’t feel so hungry. “He also asks my younger sister to stay at home instead of going to school and spending the whole day hungry.”   Even on the days Martha does attend classes, she says that she falls behind and finds it difficult to understand the new lessons. “There was a topic that was taught when I wasn’t at school, so I tried to catch up, but it’s difficult because the explanation my friends gave me was different from the way the teacher taught it.”   Clement Makuak has been a teacher for more than 16 years, teaching mathematics, science and English. Each day when he takes the register at the school Martha attends, he says he counts fewer and fewer children in his classroom.   “When I come to school and make the attendance calls in class, I’ve found some gaps. Girls especially are not turning up to school. I call their names out, asking ‘Where is this or that girl?’ But they’re not in the classroom.”   On a regular day at noon, hundreds of children would queue up in windingly long lines to receive their school lunch. A hunger-stifling, powerful combination of beans and rice was served daily to eager students, many of them motivated to attend school for the food that they received.   The food crisis affecting families like Martha’s has resulted in many children having to rely on the school meal programmes - usually provided by NGOs, with main funding from the World Food Programme (WFP) - to have at least a second meal a day. However, due to country-wide funding cuts, NGOs have been forced to limit programmes to a smaller number of schools.   Martha’s school is one of 38 within Lakes State that Plan International supports with school meal programmes, through which it provides lunches to 21,000 children a day. Previously, the organisation had supported 71 schools, but this year it says it has been forced to scale back programmes after losing critical funding from the WFP.   Although NGOs are working to secure funding from new sources to reach more families, the cuts mean that many schools cannot offer meals at all. As a result, many children across Rumbek now eat only one meal a day.   “We only eat once a day, in the evening, but in the morning and at lunchtime we don’t eat,” says Hellena*, another pupil at the school Martha attends. The 17-year-old speaks shyly, as it is not common to talk about lack of food or hunger in the community.   Hellena looks healthy, yet, like many of her peers, she isn’t eating enough food at a key age for growth and mental development since it hasn’t rained on local farms for almost two months.   “The crops that my parents normally grow are peanuts, sorghum, and maize. But we haven’t harvested because the rain has taken a long time to come. "Now, we eat pumpkin leaves. It’s only the plant that has survived, but it didn’t bear any fruit,” she explains.   The family struggles to pay for school fees and food with the small income they get. Hellena’s father sells small bags of sugar by the roadside and her mother used to sell peanut paste, but she has stopped since she cannot afford to buy the peanuts at the ever-increasing market prices.   “Life has become very difficult for me and my classmates,” Hellena says, sitting next to her friends at school who all find it hard to study since the food crisis began. She finds it especially tough to concentrate on and understand her afternoon classes. “I feel that I can only be very active and pay attention in the morning up to 11am, but from then on I can no longer pay attention."   Like Martha, many of the other girls have also skipped class.   Hellena explains that she’s stayed home several times because there is no one else to look after her siblings while her mother looks for food.   “Sometimes you’ll see a friend at school, then the next day she is missing. Their attendance can be on and off,” she adds.   When schoolteacher Clement visited the home of one of his female students who had stopped attending class, he found that she had been tasked with household chores and looking after her younger siblings while her parents went out in search of food and water.   “I followed up at home to ask the parents why one particular girl wasn’t coming to school. When I arrived at their home, I found the girl alone,” he shares. “Her parents were not there, and when I talked to her she said to me, ‘My parents told me to stay at home to look after the children, fetch water, and to look for some food for the children while they are out looking for food.’”   Grace, 14, dreams of one day becoming a computer scientist, but she too has been struggling to concentrate on her studies recently. “I only eat once a day,” she says in a soft and low tone while sitting near the open kitchen at her home in Rumbek, where the family just ate what she cooked.   “Today I ate pumpkin leaves, but it’s not enough. I feel like I still need more. Later, when I start doing homework and other things like fetching water, which is far away, I will feel weak and without enough energy.”   Although Grace’s family lives near her school, water has always been far away and she needs to walk for 30 minutes to reach a water point.   The presence of food also dictates her family’s daily priorities – whether Grace will need to help look for things to eat, or stay home to help take care of the younger siblings, wherever her help is most needed.   “I have skipped class sometimes because there was a time when we didn’t even have any green leaves. So, I had to stay with the children while mum went to look for food. I felt bad; I wanted to go to school,” Grace says.   Yet, even when there is some food at home, and she gets to go to school, she struggles to stay focused and understand her lessons.   “During a lesson, if you haven't eaten anything, you don’t feel like writing. You don’t feel like listening to anything that the teacher is telling you.”   Gender is linked to hunger in ways that are often overlooked, says Plan International. “Looking at the local context of Rumbek and how gender and GBV issues can affect people who are also in need of food assistance is important,” Nyanagok explains.   “This is particularly important during dry spells, like the one which just affected the community. During these periods people can’t cultivate, so they end up with no food, and as a result gender disparities can happen.”   Last year was also not an easy one in Rumbek as community groups fought one another, and violence ranged from cattle raiding to revenge killings, schoolteacher Clement explains. The continuous fighting prevented the community from cultivating their lands, which already affected the availability of food even before the crises this year hit local communities.   “What happened this year is that there is hunger,” Clement says. “Last year people were in a community crisis, there was a lot of fighting that prevented the people from farming. Then, the rain not coming this year was a big problem because we survive on rainfall. When there is rain, we plant our seeds.”   Teachers like Clement are making efforts to get girls back into school. “Although it is clear that both boys and girls are affected by this situation, girls will be more at risk,” he laments. “Our parents here think that it should be the girl who stays at home and takes care of the children for hours or even a few days. This is so that the mother can go far distances looking for food. So, when this happens, I call the parents to school and tell them about the importance of a girl’s education.”   Despite these strides - and even though girls may return to school – the challenges of diminished food supplies, hunger pangs and its effects continue.   As a girl, Grace often finds herself eating less than boys. “The girl is the one who serves the food for their mothers, so when mum says, ‘Add some food for the boys,’ you do it. I see that as if they’re not being fair to us, because, why add food for the boys and not for us? We’re just the same. But I would never say this to anyone because it’s not good. It’d be like I don’t want my brothers having more food.”   Nyanagok from Plan International says: “We have encountered many situations where girls have less food to eat compared to boys. It is a cultural thing…”   “As a girl, you are the one who cooks and your brothers are supposed to be given more food. In our culture there is a prioritising of boys.”   In raising awareness with communities, “we tell people that boys and girls are equal, especially the children because they are growing so they need an equal share of food”, Nyanagok adds.   “These are things that happen in the community and we are targeting them. Because of the raising of awareness through activities, there are a lot of changes happening,” she says.   However, the challenges that local communities now face inevitably take a toll on those most vulnerable, Nyanagok says.   “The current funding crisis and the hunger crisis brought on by the dry spell have deeply affected the community and especially the more vulnerable people have taken the brunt of the crisis.”   Especially for children, “it is really hard and heart-breaking”, she says.   “Many children used to wake up and were mentally prepared knowing that they were going to school and would have something to eat there. So, they woke up excited to go to school. But now, they lack motivation because they go from morning till late afternoon without eating at all.”   Many of the children at this school - and across South Sudan as a whole - are now lucky to get one full meal a day, Plan International says.   “January was the last month that I ate two meals,” Martha admits, saying her family only eats once a day now: posho, or corn meal, with a sauce and salt.   “During this time of drought, I feel hungrier. I feel weak. When I’m doing something I can’t manage it like before. I also get stomach aches and headaches,” she says. “It feels bad.”   *Only first names have been used to safeguard the pupils’ privacy.   A Global Food Crisis. (Plan International)   We are in the midst of a devastating global food crisis. Conflict, climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and soaring food prices have led to a steep rise in hunger in countries across the world. Today, millions of children are facing the worst hunger crisis that the world has seen in decades.   Forty-five million people are close to starvation right now – facing famine or famine-like conditions – with children and women hit the hardest. Twenty-six million children under 5 are suffering from wasting, which is the most visible and life-threatening form of malnutrition.   Unless action is taken now, more lives will be lost and the devastating effects on the lives of children, especially girls, today will be felt for decades to come.   The reasons for hunger and food insecurity are many and vary from country to country, but generally, it is a result of conflict, poverty, economic shocks such as hyperinflation and rising commodity prices and environmental shocks such as flooding or drought.   The conflict in Ukraine has sent global food prices skyrocketing. A third of the world’s wheat supplies come from Ukraine or Russia. Ukraine also supplies the world with sunflower oil, barley, maize, and fertilisers. But ongoing conflict means that fields won’t be prepared, crops won’t be planted and fertilisers won’t be available.   COVID-19 also caused a sharp rise in poverty and inequality globally, as lockdowns devastated family livelihoods. In many countries, pandemic restrictions also meant disruption to food supplies, slowing remittances from family overseas and the halting of school meal programmes. Steep rises in food prices are also creating immense strain on household budgets, with the poorest families hardest hit.   According to the UN, at least 828 million people were severely food insecure already in 2020 – an increase of 148 million on the previous year.   Conflict is the biggest cause of hunger globally, and is responsible for 65% of the people facing acute food insecurity. From Mali to Syria to Mozambique, protracted fighting destroys livelihoods and forces families to flee their homes, leaving countless children, including girls, facing hunger. It also makes it extremely difficult and dangerous for humanitarian organisations to reach communities in need.   It is estimated that over 14 million people in the Central Sahel countries of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance.   Climate change has contributed to food insecurity by changing weather patterns such as rainfall, increased climatic shocks such as hurricanes, cyclones, floods and droughts which all have an impact on harvests. Climate change has also increased the prevalence of crop pests such as locusts, which damage and destroy harvests.   Inflation and economic shocks has impacted the access to food for many people. Even if food is available, for many people it is too expensive to buy reducing people’s access to food. Linked to the Pandemic, many people have lost their livelihoods and income, again reducing families’ ability to purchase food.   Hunger affects girls, boys, women and men differently. When food is scarce, girls often eat less and eat last. Women and girls account for 70% of the world’s hungry. And as families and communities come under strain, girls are more likely than boys to be taken out of school, and will be at risk of child, early and forced marriage, gender-based violence, sexual exploitation and unwanted pregnancy.   Adolescent girls in Burkina Faso, Mali and South Sudan have told us that they are more likely to be married at a young age if their families are struggling financially.   Adolescents and children under the age of 5 are particularly vulnerable if they are malnourished, because of the increased rate at which they are growing and their bodies are changing. Being hungry during these critical years can stunt growth and have a significant impact on brain development, with profound consequences for a child’s educational attainment, health and future earning potential.   Hunger is also particularly dangerous for adolescent girls and women who are pregnant or breastfeeding, increasing their risk of miscarriage or dying in childbirth. For their children, it can increase the risk of stillbirth or newborn death, low birth weight and stunting, leading to an intergenerational cycle of malnutrition.   Food crises can have devastating consequences for girls’ education. Already less likely to attend school than boys, when families are hungry, girls are increasingly called upon to care for younger siblings so parents can work or seek food. All too often, they are forced to miss or drop out of school, damaging their future prospects and placing them at greater risk of gender-based violence and harmful practices such as early marriage or female genital mutilation/cutting. As a result of school closures alone, 239 million children globally are currently missing out on meals.   We can’t afford to wait until more countries reach emergency levels of food insecurity. Children are already dying from hunger. The time to act is now – there shouldn’t be any further delay.   Governments, donors and humanitarian actors must urgently contribute funding to support almost 49 million people on the brink of famine and promote the resilience of the millions of food insecure people. Failure to do so will likely result in widespread starvation as well as a complete collapse of agricultural livelihood strategies and assets.   Governments and donors must supply funding for food, nutrition, protection, education and livelihood support. This includes school feeding programmes, which should be adapted to carry on when schools are closed to reach the most vulnerable children and girls.   Food distributions and cash transfers must be scaled up to reach those in dire need. Protection mechanisms must be put in place to prevent and respond to surging protection issues, and communities must be supported to grow nutritious foods in order to prevent dietary nutrition deficits that impact children under 5 and adolescent girls the most.   http://plan-international.org/emergencies/global-food-crisis/   Sep. 2022   A generation at risk: nearly half of global food crisis hungry are children reports the World Food Programme (WFP)   WFP estimates that the global food crisis has pushed an additional 23 million under-18s into acute food insecurity since the start of the year, taking the total of children now affected to 153 million. This represents nearly half of the 345 million people facing acute hunger, according to WFP data from 82 countries.   The global food crisis is threatening the futures of millions of school-aged children who have only just returned to classrooms following the Covid-19 pandemic. Emerging evidence points to unprecedented learning losses during the pandemic, which risk being further compounded by this current food crisis.   “As every parent and teacher understands, hunger is one of the biggest barriers to effective learning – and the surge in hunger among school-age children now poses a real and present danger to a learning recovery. For children who are going hungry in their classrooms, we have a ready-made, cost-effective antidote – school meal programmes. Let’s use it", says UN Special Envoy for Global Education Gordon Brown.   WFP and partners are calling for an ambitious plan of action to restore school meal programmes disrupted by the pandemic and to expand their reach to an additional 73 million children.   The plan would supplement wider measures to combat child hunger, including an expansion of child and maternal health programmes, support for out-of-school children, and increased investment in safety net programmes.   Hunger levels among the 250 million children now out of school are almost certainly higher than for those in school, the WFP warns.   “Millions of children are living with the consequences of the mutually reinforcing food and learning crises. Yet the link between hunger and lost opportunities for learning needs to be more prominent on the international agenda – and school meal programs can help break that link. Not investing in school meals programs is perhaps one of the worst possible economic decisions governments and donors can make, especially now,” says Carmen Burbano, Director of WFP’s School-based Programmes Division.   School meal programmes are among the largest and most effective social safety nets for school-aged children. They not only keep children, particularly girls, in school, but help improve learning outcomes by providing better and more nutritious diets.   They also support local economies, create jobs and livelihoods in communities, and ultimately help break the links between hunger and the learning crisis.   Wawira Njiru, who leads the Food for Education Foundation, an NGO which delivers school meal programmes in Kenya:   “The long-term effects of hunger and malnutrition are devastating for Kenya, and children in particular. Children do not have a vote, and they are not asked what their top priorities are. We have a moral duty to ensure that everyone is better protected from food price spikes and economic shocks. Failure to do so is quite literally handicapping the future of our country,” said Njiru.   The School Meals Coalition, made up of 70 countries, supported by more than 70 organizations has worked to scale up school meals programmes as a response to the crisis.   Fati N’zi-Hassane, from the African Union Development Agency, which is a member of the School Meal Coalition’s taskforce, said: “African countries have long recognized the benefits of school feeding to protect children's health, nutrition, and education, whilst strengthening local food systems. Country ownership and commitment is the key. Efforts to protect and scale up these programmes are now more important than ever, to protect the young people of Africa from the colliding food and education crises.”   Despite some progress, inadequate funding, a bleak global economic outlook and debt distress in low-income countries remain significant barriers to expanding school meal programmes.   WFP and education partners, are calling for: the prioritization of school health and nutrition programmes; the scale up of safety nets such as school meals as part of the food crisis response; and a robust donor response to match domestic commitments already being made by low- and lower middle-income countries.   These actions should also be monitored to help drive greater ambition and provide critical accountability. This must be done alongside core investments in maternal and child health and nutrition services to maximise impact throughout the first 8000 days of life and to set children up for a healthier and more prosperous life.   http://www.wfp.org/school-feeding Visit the related web page
	When crisis hits, women do not stop giving birth by United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)   Dec. 2022   Humanitarian Action Overview 2023, by UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem:   In Somalia just a few weeks ago, I met displaced women and children at a camp near the border with Ethiopia. The women had walked for days and weeks across a parched landscape. They were in search of food, of water and of safety.   They told me about the dangers and hardships they face continually amid the unrelenting conflict and ever-present hunger. It was heartbreaking. They asked me to help them get increased support because they need it urgently.   Already elevated rates of maternal mortality could soar even higher if pregnant women can’t access the care they need. Incidents of gender-based violence are rising. That leaves many women traumatized and in desperate need of services to help them heal and protect their dignity.   As humanitarian crises escalate all around the world, it’s always women and girls who are paying an unacceptable price.   Globally, women and children are the vast majority of the more than 103 million people who are forcibly displaced from their homes due to persecution, to violence, to natural disasters, and to human rights violations.   They face a deepening health and protection crisis due to the converging challenges of climate change, armed conflict, rising food insecurity, and the global economic downturn, all of which is devastating for women, many of whom are heads of household and devastating for ever so vulnerable girls.   UNFPA is calling for priority increased investment in the health and protection of women and girls affected by crises. With humanitarian needs growing, it’s up to all of us to ensure that sexual and reproductive health services, adequate nutrition, and protection from gender-based violence become integral and automatic to every humanitarian response.   UNFPA delivers for women and girls in the hardest-to-reach places. For instance, I’m now able to announce that, as we speak, 10 truckloads of much-needed reproductive health supplies, equipment and medicine are arriving in the Tigray region of Ethiopia – the first shipment of such supplies to Tigray in a long time due to prior lack of access.   And in Afghanistan, in Central Highlands, the least developed part of the country, UNFPA-supported midwives are heroically delivering services at family health houses. UNFPA is constantly listening to women and young people in the community and bringing them together to provide valuable feedback on our programming and our training.   In 2022, UNFPA lifesaving assistance reached over 30 million women, girls, and young people in more than 60 countries.   Next year, in 2023, UNFPA is appealing for funding support, essential for us to bring lifesaving services and protection to the doorsteps and the tents of 66 million women, girls and young people in 65 countries.   We are determined to scale up UNFPA humanitarian operations, and to localize our response. I’m proud to tell you that 38% of UNFPA humanitarian funds go directly to local partners, often women-led.   As the United Nations lead agency for addressing gender-based violence in humanitarian settings, UNFPA is working closely with such women-led organizations to identify sustainable solutions.   These groups are actively involved in decision-making. The women know the culture, they understand the situation and they can provide appropriate solutions for the people we’re trying to help. We act together in partnership on what we learn.   In times of humanitarian crisis, women and girls depend on receiving support to maintain their hope and to keep moving forward.   http://www.unfpa.org/HAO2023 http://www.unfpa.org/emergencies http://www.ohchr.org/en/women/right-better-world   * As maternal deaths soar in Lebanon, midwives step in to try to stem the tide.   Maternal mortality rates are soaring in Lebanon, which has been in a downward economic spiral since 2019. Poverty has increased, hospitals have been on the brink of closing due to fuel and electricity shortages, the price of transport has risen, and an estimated 40% of doctors have left the country – factors that have all made healthcare less accessible. Between 2019 and 2021, the number of women dying due to complications from pregnancy or childbirth has nearly tripled. That’s one of the reasons the Lebanese Order of Midwives is stepping up emergency care to women. Funded by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the group hopes to hire some 300 midwives to go door-to-door, visiting women who may be in need. Diana Barakat is one of those midwives. “I can already see that the need is huge,” Barkat told The New Humanitarian.   http://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news-feature/2023/01/24/maternal-deaths-Lebanon-midwives/   Sep. 2022   UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem on the devastating floods in Pakistan:   Our hearts go out to the people of Pakistan during this devastating time, as heavy monsoon rains have flooded a third of the country, affecting more than 33 million people, of whom an estimated 650,000 are pregnant women.   We are deeply saddened by the destruction, and are working with the Government, our United Nations and NGO partners to support the humanitarian response and secure a speedy recovery from this disaster.   Women and girls bear the brunt of the devastating impacts of climate change and the rising prevalence of natural disasters. When crisis hits, women do not stop getting pregnant and giving birth, and the risk of violence escalates rapidly. Sexual and reproductive health services are often severely impacted, forcing women to give birth without much-needed medical support. Access to family planning and menstrual hygiene products can also be disrupted.   Of the 33 million people affected, 6.4 million need immediate humanitarian assistance, including more than 1.6 million women of reproductive age. An estimated 128,000 of these women are pregnant, with 42,000 births expected in the next three months.   UNFPA is scaling up its emergency response to provide life-saving reproductive healthcare, medical equipment and medicines, gender-based violence services, and dignity kits for women and girls.   With more than 500 health facilities damaged in Sindh province, and 240 health facilities damaged in affected districts in Balochistan, UNFPA is urgently providing hospital tents, reproductive health kits and life-saving supplies to affected areas so that vital health services can continue.   Given the deeply concerning reports of incidents of gender-based violence, we are working with partners to provide prevention and response services including medical and psychosocial support.   UNFPA is committed to supporting the people of Pakistan as they respond to this catastrophe, which has destroyed lives, houses, livelihoods, crops and infrastructure.   http://www.unfpa.org/press/statement-unfpa-executive-director-dr-natalia-kanem-devastating-floods-pakistan   24 Aug. 2022   After six months of war, physical and mental scars ravage generations across Ukraine   From forced displacement, severe shortages of reproductive health care and the high risk of sexual violence, the war in Ukraine is having a disproportionate impact on women and girls.   For thousands of pregnant women without access to essential services, childbirth is now fraught with added danger: Many hospitals are citing higher numbers of premature babies, health facilities are destroyed and damaged, and staff and supplies are running increasingly low.   Mothers and newborns fight for survival   Nataliia was four months pregnant when the war started. Despite the shelling, she decided to stay in the Kyiv region: It was where she had given birth to her three other children and was her haven. She told UNFPA, “We felt safe in our house, although our days were filled with sirens and nothing was like it used to be.”   Yet the family were too afraid to venture outside and the mounting pressures of daily life began to weigh on her. With her anxiety and stress levels soaring, Nataliia’s waters broke two months before her due date: Her son, Artem, was born later that day weighing just 1.6 kilograms.   “He was very ill, and so tiny. I couldn’t hold him because he was too fragile,” she said. Spending the first two weeks of his life in an incubator, he received critical care from staff at the Kyiv perinatal hospital, one of more than 30 facilities UNFPA has supported since the war began.   Although Nataliia is now home in Kyiv, Artem’s traumatic birth is all too fresh in her mind: “As a mother, there is nothing worse than going through long months of pregnancy, followed by painful labour, only to see your baby fighting for his life.”   Delivering under fire   The World Health Organization has reported more than 473 attacks on health facilities in Ukraine. Some 12 million people are currently estimated to need health assistance, while more than 15 million require protection support.   UNFPA has so far reached more than 6 million people with sexual and reproductive health supplies and services since the war broke out, providing over 80 tonnes of equipment and medicine to fill critical gaps in 37 hospitals, helping ensure safe birth and emergency obstetric services.   With women and girls also at increased risk of sexual exploitation and violence during conflict and displacement, UNFPA is working with 27 facilities for survivors, including shelters, crisis rooms and daycare centres. Over 100 mobile health teams have been deployed across the country, offering psychosocial support even in the most hard-to-reach and conflict-ravaged areas.   A toll too heavy to bear   Six months after Russia invaded Ukraine, death, destruction and devastation haunt the country’s streets. Some 6.6 million people are internally displaced and nearly 7 million are refugees in neighbouring countries – the vast majority of them women and children. More than 1,500 women and girls are reported to have been killed since the start of the war and over 1,200 injured – although the true number is expected to far exceed this.   Conflict should never strip women of their fundamental rights, including their right to give birth safely and with dignity, and to live free from violence and abuse.   http://www.unfpa.org/news/after-six-months-war-physical-and-mental-scars-ravage-generations-across-ukraine Visit the related web page
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