In yet another risk from the pandemic, global youth charity warns that the number of girls likely to be forced into child marriage will rise by at least half a million this year.
The UK non-profit Save the Children said the pandemic is undoing 25 years of progress in reducing child marriage rates globally. It said that Covid-19 forced school closures and experience from previous outbreaks suggest that most of these girls will never be able to return to schools.
Before the pandemic, 12 million girls were wedded off before age annually but after the outbreak this number rise as high as 14.5 million. Young girls in South Asia will face the worst of this brunt, the charity added.