The World Bank suggested upwards of 150 million people could be pushed into “extreme poverty” due to the virus pandemic, erasing nearly three years of progress in global poverty reductions.
According to the report, for the first time in two decades, the virus pandemic, compounded by the effects of climate change, are slowing poverty reduction progress, resulting in an additional 88 million to 115 million people falling into extreme poverty this year, with total estimates of 150 million in 2021, depending on the economic recovery shape.
The biennial Poverty and Shared Prosperity Report defines “extreme poverty” as living on less than $1.90 per day, which is likely to affect between 9.1%-9.4% of the world’s population this year. With the world’s poverty rate expected to rise this year, it would mean extreme poverty is at 2017’s 9.2% level, marking the first rise in the poverty rate in two decades. The rate was expected to drop to 7.5% by 2021 before the coronavirus pandemic.
Hellbound and Down 