Students Have Lost Over A Third Of Their School Year Due To Covid

Analysis of United Nations figures shows that kids in South Asia and Latin America missed out on almost triple the education of those in Western Europe

EDUCATION

LONDON: Children worldwide have lost more than a third of the standard global 190-day school year because of the coronavirus pandemic, Save the Children said Tuesday following a wide-ranging research review.

The London-based charity urged governments and donors to take swift action to prevent “an irreversible impact” on the lives of millions of children who now may never return to school.

It analysed data compiled primarily by UNESCO, the UN educational and cultural organisation, and UNICEF, the UN body dedicated to children.

The figures showed that children have missed 74 days of education on average due to school closures caused by the global health crisis, and a lack of access to remote learning. Using the UN agencies’ statistics and data from the US-based Center for Global Development, the charity calculated that 112 billion school days had been lost in total and the poorest were disproportionately affected.