As International Children’s Day, 1 June, approaches, UNICEF and the National Statistical Institute presented “Children in Bulgaria: Key data and tendencies in 2024”, an analysis of the demographic, health, educational, social and economic indicators.

There are 1.1 million children living in Bulgaria, UNICEF-Bulgaria reports. There are positive tendencies such as a sustainable drop in infant mortality rate – from 7.6 per 1,000 in 2014 down to 4.5 per 1,000 last year, as well as the fact that the immunization coverage has gone up in 2022, and 90% of the children receive the obligatory vaccines.

Despite these positive tendencies, however, there are still serious challenges to children’s wellbeing in Bulgaria. There is practically no change, in the past 5 years, in the number of children registered at the child pedagogical offices – from 8,899 in 2020 to 8,430 in 2024.

In the recent UNICEF report “Child Well-Being in an Unpredictable World”, which analyses the position of children in the wealthiest countries, Bulgaria ranks 28^th out of 36 countries in 6 key indicators.

The aggregate data for Bulgaria shows that life satisfaction, obesity and academic skills of Bulgarian children have deteriorated compared to the previous report from 2018. The current report also notes the lack of communication between parents and adolescents, with only 64% of them stating that they talk to their parents at least once a week. 

Edited by Diana Tsankova
Translated and posted by Milena Daynova
Photo: UNICEF-Bulgaria