Global

A volunteer guides and instructs girls in a town in Yemen, on the proper way to wash their hands.
© UNICEF/Dhia Al-Adimi

COVID-19 vaccines: Donors urged to step up funding for needy countries

11 December 2020
Health

Addressing the financing gap to provide COVID-19 vaccines for everyone, everywhere, is an urgent priority, World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday, in an appeal for stepped-up funding to support poorer countries. 

Cordillera Huayhuash in August 2019. The Andes contain 99% of the world's tropical glaciers and 71% are in Peru.
UN News/Daniela Gross

Hunger rising in mountain regions due to biodiversity loss, climate change

11 December 2020
Climate and Environment

Although many of the world’s most important crops and livestock species originate in mountain regions, hunger is rising in these areas due to biodiversity loss and climate change, according to a joint study published on Friday by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and partners. 

Wearing a full protective suit, a woman doctor who leads a group of volunteer medical professionals attending to COVID-19 patients and persons under investigation at a community hospital in the Philippines.
UN Women/Louie Pacardo

COVID-19 shows ‘urgent need’ for solidarity, UN chief tells Nobel forum

11 December 2020
Peace and Security

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for global solidarity and greater international cooperation, and must be turned into an opportunity for fundamental change, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a keynote address to the Nobel Peace Prize Forum on Friday. 

The World Food Programme provides poor and food insecure families in Gaza with electronic food vouchers which give them access to local products (file photo).
WFP/Wissam Nassar

Rich countries’ support for children ‘totally inadequate’: UN report

10 December 2020
Humanitarian Aid

The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, slams the levels of financial support for children allocated by high-income countries during the pandemic as totally inadequate, in a child poverty report issued on Friday.

David Beasley, Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme, receives the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to WFP in 2020.
© WFP/Rein Skullerud

WFP chief uses Nobel speech as call for action to avert ‘hunger pandemic’

10 December 2020
Humanitarian Aid

With 270 million people – more than the entire population of Western Europe – “marching toward starvation”, the head of the World Food Programme (WFP) called for greater action to avert a “hunger pandemic”, in accepting the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the UN agency on Thursday. 

Solar panels on the roof of the UN Conference Centre (UNCC) at the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), in Bangkok, Thailand.
UN News/Vibhu Mishra

UN makes progress on 'greening the blue'

10 December 2020
Climate and Environment

In 2019, the UN system continued to make steady progress towards reducing its environmental footprint, recording decreases in emissions and implementing advanced environment management systems. 

A health worker checks a woman’s blood sugar level at a community health centre in Jayapura district, Indonesia (file photo).
UNICEF/Shehzad Noorani

Non-communicable diseases killing more people than ever before: UN health agency

10 December 2020
Health

Non-communicable diseases account for 7 of the world’s top 10 causes of death, a sharp increase from two decades ago, and heart disease remains the leading cause of death globally, a new UN World Health Organization (WHO) study has found. 

Mauritanian students return to school after several months of school closures due to COVID-19.
© UNICEF/Raphael Pouget

Human rights must be ‘front and centre’ of COVID-19 response: Secretary-General

10 December 2020
Human Rights

UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for human rights to be put “front and centre” of COVID-19 response and recovery globally in order to achieve a better future for people everywhere.  

A mural on a blast wall in downtown Kabul commemorates journalists killed in Afghanistan in 2016.
UNAMA/Fardin Waezi

World Press Freedom Conference spotlights dangerous job of separating ‘truth from falsehood’

9 December 2020
Culture and Education

Prominent journalists and champions of press freedom from across the world are examining ways to overcome increasing challenges facing the media during a two-day online conference organized jointly by the UN’s cultural and educational agency, UNESCO, and the Netherlands.

COVID-19 brought to the fore wide spread racial discrimination.
Unsplash/Thomas de Luze

UN’s Bachelet slams ‘reprehensible’ political leadership during pandemic, sees hope in new US administration 

9 December 2020
Human Rights

Some political leadership during the pandemic has been “reprehensible”, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said on Wednesday, while holding out hope of a better 2021 as US President-elect Joe Biden takes office.