Press releases

Wednesday 26 November 2025, London: Today the Government has announced a full scrap of the harmful two-child limit policy on Universal Credit from April 2026. 

Geneva/New York/Copenhagen, 24 November 2025 – Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and UNICEF today announced a new agreement that will make the R21/Matrix-M™ malaria vaccines significantly more accessible and affordable, paving the way to protect more children from one of the world’s deadliest diseases.

DAKAR/ABUJA, 22 November 2025 – Scores of children and teachers were reportedly abducted from a secondary school in Niger State, Nigeria, in the early hours of Friday, just days after a separate attack in Kebbi State on Monday led to the abduction of 25 girls from a boarding school.

More than 1 in 5 children in low- and middle-income countries – or 417 million – are severely deprived in at least two vital areas critical for their health, development, and wellbeing, according to UNICEF’s flagship report issued on World Children’s Day today. Record numbers of children are living in poverty across the UK. The UK saw a 34% increase in relative child income poverty between 2013 and 2023. The UK has the highest increase in relative child income poverty of the 37 high-income countries reviewed.

PANAMA CITY, 17 November 2025 – Three weeks after Hurricane Melissa hit the Caribbean, nearly 477,000 children are experiencing significant disruptions to their schooling due to damaged or temporarily closed schools across Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica.

London, UK, October 10 2025 - UNICEF UK Ambassador Arlo Parks joined pupils at Moreland School in Islington for a Dove Self-Esteem Project workshop (DSEP) focused on building body confidence and self-esteem.

PORT-AU-PRINCE/NEW YORK, 9 October 2025 – The number of children displaced by violence in Haiti has almost doubled in the past year, with 680,000 now uprooted from their homes, according to a new UNICEF Child Alert report released today. Overall, more than 1.3 million people are displaced across the country as spiraling violence, collapsing services, and lack of humanitarian access push Haiti deeper into crisis. 

GENEVA/KYIV, 28 August 2025 – “A wave of deadly attacks hit Kyiv during the early hours of this morning – reportedly killing four children, including a toddler. At least 10 children were reportedly injured. The children were at home in their beds, trying to sleep.  

ADDIS ABABA — An estimated 8.2 percent of the global population, or about 673 million people, experienced hunger in 2024, down from 8.5 percent in 2023 and 8.7 percent in 2022. However, progress was not consistent across the globe, as hunger continued to rise in most subregions of Africa and western Asia, according to this year’s The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI 2025) report published today by five specialized agencies of the United Nations.

New UK Government data released today shows 1.6 million children are locked out of financial support due to the number of siblings they have, and the vast majority (1.1 million children) are living in families with a child or baby under 5 years old. 

“This strategy is a very welcome and essential step toward closing the inequalities gap in early childhood and will give children the best start in life that they all deserve, particularly in its recognition that poverty and inequality must be addressed in the early years. The commitment to invest in and bring together local services through Best Start Family Hubs is vital and will go a long way to meeting the needs of families with babies and young children. 

KYIV/GENEVA, 4 July 2025 – The verified number of children killed or injured in Ukraine between 1 March and 31 May 2025 increased by more than 200 per cent compared to the previous quarter, according to data from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission to Ukraine.

25 June 2025 – Dr Philip Goodwin, Chief Executive Officer for the UK Committee for UNICEF (UNICEF UK), said: “This pledge from the UK Government will bring Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, closer to its ambitious goal of reaching another 500 million children worldwide with critical vaccines and vitally, saving another nine million lives by 2030.

23 June 2025 – UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell today concluded a three-day mission to Chad, warning of the worsening crisis affecting children in the eastern part of the country that has seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Sudan.

21 June 2025 – At the end of a mission to Burkina Faso, UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell called for urgent action to protect children across the Sahel whose lives are upended by insecurity, displacement and climate change.

AMMAN/GENEVA, 20 June 2025 – “In a war already defined by its brutality, Gaza now teeters at its deadliest edge. Currently just 40 per cent of drinking water production facilities remain functional in Gaza (87 out of 217). Without fuel, every one of these will stop operating within weeks.

19 June 2025 – The number of malnourished children in the Gaza Strip is rising at an alarming rate, with 5,119 children between 6 months and 5 years of age admitted for treatment for acute malnutrition in May alone.

Returning to a neonatal care unit for the first time since her own daughter was born prematurely, Oti reflected: “Seeing the work and meeting mums like Ouattara brought everything home.”

New analysis from the UK Committee for UNICEF (UNICEF UK) exposes the stark impact of deprivation on babies and young children’s life chances across England. It reveals that where a child is born and raised up to the age of five can influence their future potential.