Every 10 seconds, a child dies of hunger we can stop

Right now, war is driving children into starvation. From Gaza to Yemen to Democratic Republic of Congo, manmade conflict is robbing millions of children of food, healthcare, and life itself.

One in four children goes to bed hungry, without enough food to keep them well. One in five is growing up surrounded by war. Every hour, more grow weaker – some are just days away from death.

This is not a famine caused by nature. It is hunger caused by war, and we have the means to fight it. Just two sachets of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) a day – peanut paste packed with life-saving nutrients – can pull a starving child back from the edge. But only if we get it to them in time.

You have the power now to help save a child’s life. But there’s no time to lose. Please send this life-saving food today – before another child’s time runs out.

Asmaa has lost her home in Gaza and could now lose her life to hunger because of the war – millions of children in conflict just like her need your help today.

Will you help send life-saving food to a child who’s running out of time?

DONATE NOW

When Abdullah was 12 months old, he weighed just 4 kilos. But thanks to treatment supported by people like you, he is on the road to recovery. 

Your support can help save babies like Abdullah

When Nisreen’s baby boy, Abdullah, started losing weight, she was terrified. At just 12 months old, he weighed half the weight of a healthy child his age. There were days she had nothing to feed him. He grew too weak to cry.

Then came the fever. Vomiting. Diarrhoea. She knew it was severe acute malnutrition, and she knew it could kill him. The nearest hospital, under-resourced after years of war in Yemen, could do nothing. But a UNICEF-supported clinic could help. There, Nisreen was given life-saving RUTF food. Slowly, Abdullah came back to life.

Not every child is as lucky. In places like Yemen and Gaza, thousands of children are at immediate risk from starvation. Your support can send life-saving food to children like these now. Please, give what you can today.

In 2024, UNICEF provided: 

• 251 million young children globally with early detection services for wasting – the most immediate, visible and life-threatening form of malnutrition.

• 352,408 children in Yemen with treatment for severe acute malnutrition.

• 3.4 million mothers in DRC with training to help spot malnutrition in children. 

• 642,044 bottles of ready-to-use infant formula to save babies lives in Gaza. 

Support from you today can help save children like Abdullah around the world from deadly hunger.

A miracle food that saves lives

When all a mother has to feed her baby is water, starch and sugar, starvation is almost inevitable. But Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) can change everything.

These small sachets of peanut paste are packed with life-saving nutrients: all the vitamins and minerals a starving child needs to recover. No water, cooking or refrigeration is needed, and parents can feed it to their children themselves.

Just a few sachets a day, for a few weeks, can be the difference between life and death.

UNICEF helps deliver 80% of the world’s RUTF. But millions more children still need it. You can help send this miracle food today.

DONATE NOW

Millions of children reached – but millions more are still waiting

Thanks to supporters like you, UNICEF has become the world’s largest supplier of RUTF life-saving food, treating 9.3 million children for severe wasting and other forms of severe acute malnutrition in 2024.

Over the last 3 years, thanks to UNICEF supporters, 21.5 million children and women have received essential services for the prevention of child wasting. And 46 million children were reached with early detection services.

But now, because of aid cuts, more than 2.4 million children around the world could go without this life-saving help for the remainder of 2025.

Can you imagine having to powerlessly watch your child slowly starve to death, while at the same time, trying to shield him from the bombs?

That’s the terrible fate facing millions of parents in countries like Yemen and Gaza. But you can help save them. Two sachets of peanut paste a day can help a starving child survive. You can send them right now.

Millions of children like this little boy in Yemen are malnourished and struggling to survive – but your support today can provide the ready-made food that has everything a child needs to recover.
A little girl eats life-saving RUTF food in Yemen. With support from people like you, UNICEF can treat and save even severely and acutely malnourished children.

You can change the story for starving children – act now

A child in a conflict zone is twice as likely to starve as a child living somewhere safe. No child deserves to die. No parent deserves to have to watch helplessly as they do.

You have the power to change the story. Your gift today can help save the life of a child battling to survive severe acute malnutrition.

  • €100 can help provide vital high-energy biscuits to keep 10 children safe from malnutrition.
  • €150 can help supply emergency therapeutic food to 15 severely acutely malnourished children.
  • €250 can help give emergency therapeutic milk to 25 children too weak to swallow solid food.

Other Ways to Donate

You can make a donation by phone by calling 01 878 3000 from Monday to Friday between 9:00-5:30pm.

Or you can send your donation by post to:

Freepost; UNICEF Ireland, 33 Lower Ormond Quay, Dublin D01 R283.

In the unlikely event that the funds raised exceed UNICEF’s funding requirements for this appeal, your donation will be directed to where the need is greatest.

Help protect children