The Magnitude and Scope of Inequalities Created and Exacerbated by COVID-19 Is Truly Shocking, High Commissioner Tells Human Rights Council
Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: the Impact of State COVID-19 Recovery Measures Is Disproportionately and Negatively Affecting Indigenous Peoples
The Human Rights Council this afternoon held a half-day panel discussion on deepening inequalities exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and their implications for the realisation of human rights, followed by an interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples.
Michelle Bachelet, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said that the magnitude and scope of inequalities that had been created and exacerbated by COVID-19 were truly shocking. The human rights scars of this pandemic ran deep and they were growing deeper. COVID-19 had led to the first rise in extreme poverty in two decades: an additional 119 to 124 million people had been pushed back into extreme poverty in 2020, and the number of people living with food insecurity had risen by 318 million, according to the Food and Agricultural Organization – amounting to an unprecedented 2.38 billion people. Vital gains were being reversed, including for women's equality and the rights of many ethnic and religious minority communities and indigenous peoples.