New York: Around 3.71 lakh babies were born on New Year’s Day, of which India accounted for nearly 60,000, according to UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
India thus accounted for 16% of newborns on January 1. They were followed by China (35,615), Nigeria (21,439), Pakistan (14,161), Indonesia (12,336), Ethiopia (12,006), the US (10,312), Egypt (9,455), Bangladesh (9,236) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (8,640), the UNICEF said.
In other words, more than half of the births on January 1 took place in only 10 countries:
As for the year 2021, an estimated 140 million children will see the light of the day, with their average life expectancy being 84 years.
Children born in India will have a life expectancy of 80.9 years.
“The children born today enter a world far different than even a year ago, and a New Year brings a new opportunity to reimagine it,” UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said in a statement.
“Children born today will inherit the world we begin to build for them – today. Let us make 2021 the year we start to build a fairer, safer, healthier world for children.”
