11m full-time jobs lost in MENA due to covid, UNICEF says

Tunisians protest over unemployment and poverty and clash with security forces in the central town of Kasserine on January 21, 2016 [MOHAMED KHALIL/AFP via Getty Images]

The coronavirus pandemic has led to the loss of 11 million full-time jobs in the MENA region, a new publication released by UNICEF says.

According to UNICEF’s Middle East and North Africa Region COVID-19 2020 report, the equivalent of 11 million full-time jobs were lost in the MENA region as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This raised the number of children living in monetary poor households to 60.1 million compared to 50.4 million before the pandemic, modelled estimates produced by UNICEF and Save the Children have said.

The first quarter of 2021 will witness a focus on ongoing support for national health entities as well as the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine in the region, the report explained.

Throughout 2020, there were 4,536,677 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the MENA region with a total of 112,208 fatalities as of 2 January 2021, according to the report.

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