Prioritise mental and emotional needs of children in country’s recovery plan

Across virtually every key measure of childhood, progress has gone backward in the 12 months since the pandemic was declared, leaving children confronting a devastating and distorted new normal, says Unicef. Photo: 123rf.com

Ten-year-old Nurfaraiin is terrified of losing her parents to the coronavirus. Every day when her father, a delivery service rider, and mother who is a cleaner, leave for work, Nurfaraiin cries. She is afraid they will come home with the virus, be taken away to the hospital and die.

“Nowadays, she cries a lot, ” says her mother, Nora, 39. “She follows me around the house and when I have to leave for work, that’s when she starts crying. She says she’s afraid I won’t come back.”