Protecting Girls From Child Marriage During COVID-19 and Always: The UNFPA–UNICEF Global Programme to End Child Marriage

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, which began as a health crisis, quickly became a human rights crisis. The pandemic, and measures put in place to limit its spread, have had adverse socioeconomic impacts on communities around the world, and risks progress on the Sustainable Development Goals – which the global community has committed to achieving by 2030 – including to end child, early and forced marriage under target 5.3. Therefore, it is more important than ever that we reimagine approaches to protect girls and accelerate action to end child marriage, supporting interventions that address the context of the current crisis and build the resilience of girls and their families to respond to future potential crises.

This publication highlights stories of some of the girls who have been reached by various interventions supported by the UNFPA-UNICEF Global Programme to End Child Marriage during COVID-19 in 2020.

The stories show how the Global Programme has continued to:

• Empower girls to know their rights, be educated and speak up in their communities
• Ensure the protection of girls through telephone helplines and outreach of social workers
• Provide girls with access to sexual and reproductive health information and services
• Enhance the legal and policy environment to protect girls’ rights