A paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association out of the University of Oxford, reported that 10.5 million children world wide have lost parents or care givers due to COVID-19 from January 1, 2020 to May 1. 2022. 7.5 million children were left orphaned with both parents dying from COVID-19. The Imperial College of London offers a daily report on the number of children who have lost a care giver on any given day. As of September 13, 2022 that number has risen to 10.6 million children.
40.6% of these children are in South East Asia, 24.3% are in Africa, 14% in the Americas, 14.6 in the Eastern Mediterranean, 4.7% in Europe, and 1.8% in the Western Pacific region. In India there are 3.5 million orphaned children due to COVID-19.
In America from April 1, 2020 through June 30, 2021, data suggest that more than 140,000 children under age 18 in the United States lost a parent, custodial grandparent, or grandparent caregiver who provided the child’s home and basic needs, including love, security, and daily care. Approximately 1 out of 500 children in the United States has experienced COVID-19-associated orphan hood or death of a grandparent caregiver. “Children facing orphan hood as a result of COVID is a hidden, global pandemic that has sadly not spared the United States,” said Susan Hillis, CDC researcher and lead author of the study.
With America’s COVID-19 relief funding being cut by the Senate across the board, there is no help for these children who have lost everything. Florida’s “Stunt Governor” Ron DeathSantis has vowed to coerce as many of Florida’s COVID orphans as he can onto a plane to Martha’s Vineyard to gain notoriety in his bid to run for president.