Across the Caribbean, young women and single mothers are getting the support they need to weather the pandemic and achieve their potential. Here, we visit UN projects in Trinidad and Tobago and, further north, in Saint Lucia.
Every Thursday, Jennifer Barros goes to Rondon 3, a refugee camp in northern Brazil near the border of Venezuela. The camp hosts 844 Venezuelan refugees and migrants, and Jennifer teaches Portuguese there. Kaleth Colmenares, 12, is always waiting for Jennifer at school. Last February he started attending a Brazilian public school and was still adapting to the new language when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Now, once a week, he gets tutoring sessions in several subjects, not least of all Portuguese.
Anong is 20 years old. She suffered serious health issues and anxiety due to the COVID-19 crisis. “I was living with a man, and things were not easy. He was forcing me to have intimate relations,” she says. “After the lockdown, he was seeing someone else while being with me. I was silent and accepted my situation. I was not protected and contracted a sexually transmitted infection.”
The Global COVAX Facility is the largest vaccine procurement and supply operation ever. UNICEF is leading the effort on behalf of the Global COVAX Facility. Together the Facility will provide 190 countries worldwide with equal access to 2 billion doses of the COVID-19 vaccine and 1 billion syringes all, delivered by the end of 2021.
In response, UN teams around the world have marshalled forces not only to stop the spread of the disease, but to deal with its many secondary effects—from massive job losses to increases in gender-based violence. Here are five ways the UN is combating the pandemic.
Thanks to collective efforts and the safe classroom and remote learning models set in place, more than a million students returned to school in Costa Rica. With the United Nations' support, Costa Rica has become one of the first countries to open its educational institutions on time, providing security and inclusion for thousands of children, adolescents, and young people.
Yemenis currently live through the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, a disaster compounded by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and severe economic crisis. Two thirds of Yemenis need humanitarian assistance to survive. More than 16 million people will face hunger this year.
UN country teams across the world are playing a critical role as they support local and national authorities to rollout vaccination efforts. They are also taking immediate and proactive measures to curtail the rise of Ebola cases in countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Guinea.
In January, tropical storm Eloíse killed at least 6 people in Mozambique. That number might seem low, but the true impact is much greater. The storm also displaced 18,000 people and has affected a total of 250,000. It also caused considerable damage to 76 health centres and 400 classrooms.
