At least 14 million children worldwide are at risk of losing access to critical nutrition services in 2025 due to severe funding cuts, UNICEF has warned, raising the alarm over a deepening global malnutrition crisis.
According to a press release, the UN children’s agency said that over 2.4 million children suffering from severe acute malnutrition—the deadliest form of hunger—could miss out on life-saving Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) for the remainder of the year.
The warning came as world leaders convened at the Nutrition for Growth Summit in Paris, where the agency urged immediate action to avert a "catastrophic" rollback of decades of progress.
UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell said the stakes could not be higher.
“We have made impressive progress in reducing child malnutrition globally because of a shared commitment and sustained investment. But steep funding cuts will dramatically reverse these gains and put the lives of millions more children at risk,” she said.
The agency reported that since 2000, the number of stunted children globally has fallen by 55 million—a reduction of one-third.
Yet, this progress is now in jeopardy. Up to 2,300 stabilization centers, which treat children with severe wasting and medical complications, and nearly 28,000 outpatient therapeutic centers face closure or significant scaling back due to the shortfall, UNICEF said.
The crisis is compounded by rising vulnerability among mothers and adolescent girls.
According to UNICEF, the number of pregnant and breastfeeding women suffering from acute malnutrition has surged by 25% since 2020, from 5.5 million to 6.9 million, a trend expected to worsen without intervention.
Conflict, climate change, and disease outbreaks are already driving up malnutrition rates in fragile regions.
In Yemen, for instance, UNICEF reported “nearly half of Yemen’s children under 5 are chronically malnourished, with stunting rates stagnant over the past decade”.
UNICEF pointed to the Child Nutrition Fund (CNF), launched in 2023 with backing from the UK, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, as a potential lifeline.
The fund aims to bolster prevention, detection, and treatment efforts, but it requires sustained donor support to succeed.
The agency called on governments to ramp up domestic funding for health and nutrition programs, warning that without urgent action, millions of children could face irreversible harm—or death.
“UNICEF is calling on governments and donors to prioritise investments in health and nutrition programmes for children and is urging national governments to allocate more funding to domestic nutrition and health services,” Russel said.
The Nutrition for Growth Summit concludes on March 28, with advocates hoping it will spur concrete commitments to tackle what UNICEF calls a “preventable tragedy.”
Additional reporting by Patrick Chiriba
