Bro, grab a coffee and sit down, 'cause I've got news that'll make you bury your head in the ground. On Children's Day, interim Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan told us on Facebook that "we have a duty to build for children a country they can trust and want to stay in." Nice, right? But on the same day, Save the Children released some figures that'll take your breath away - like they're from a different movie, not Bolojan's Romania. Check it, bro: three in ten Romanian kids are affected by poverty and at risk of social exclusion, and the infant mortality rate has jumped to its highest level in ten years. And me and Mioara, we're barely waiting for Ioana's child allowance to buy her a new backpack, but it feels pointless to dream when reality smacks you in the face. Seriously, it's like they're mocking us on holidays.
Let me hit you with the numbers, 'cause they're scary, no joke. At the start of 2025, Romania had 3,610,644 kids - that's 19% of the population. In 2025, only 145,725 kids were born, the lowest number since 1930, 11,545 fewer than in 2024. Man, if we don't get moving, we'll be counting on our fingers. And here's the kicker: the share of families who can't afford a meal with meat at least once every two days rose from 14.6% to 17.2% for all families with kids, and for single-parent families - from 19.5% to 25.9%. These ain't stories, they're facts.
Poverty hits education too, bro. A Save the Children study from summer 2025 shows that 58% of families with kids in their programs can't cover school expenses without outside help. Nearly half - 46.8% - of poor kids don't go on school trips or events, compared to the EU average of 13.9%. Romania has the lowest enrollment rate in education for kids between 3 and school-starting age: 76.5%, vs. the EU average of 95%. More and more kids are out of school: in middle school, the rate jumped from 12.3% in 2021 to 17.09% in 2024, and in high school, from 23.02% to 27.23%. That means a quarter of high schoolers don't even set foot in school anymore. And me, with Brian, I struggle to get him to watch lessons on YouTube, 'cause the teachers are a mess, but at least he's in the system.
The phenomenon of minor mothers is another shame. The probability of a newborn having low birth weight jumps from 8.04% to 15.9% for mothers under 15. 43.3% of births to mothers under 15 had no prenatal care, compared to the national average of 28.35%. And vaccination, God forbid: coverage for the first dose of MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) is only 47.4%. In Argeș county - where PSD rules, from Topoloveni to Mioveni - coverage is minimal, at 23.7%. In Bihor it's highest, at 73.8%. How can you have such big differences? Who's responsible?
And what about kids' happiness, man? Only 3 in 5 kids feel frequently happy, and 32% say they feel enthusiastic rarely or very rarely. A quarter of kids feel frequently sad, and 56% often suffer from fatigue. Digital exposure is a bomb: over a third of kids aged 12-14 have public profiles on social media. Nearly half of teens have been approached by strangers online, and a third reported harassment or uncomfortable interactions. Over two-thirds have been exposed to traumatic content, and 60% have witnessed cyberbullying. Only 5% of kids seek adult support when facing dangers. At school, 90% of teachers and counselors believe students are victims of bullying - more common in Bucharest schools (28.1%) than in rural ones (13.4%). So, while Bolojan posts nice messages, our kids are left to fend for themselves. I'm off to tell Mioara what hopes we have left on Children's Day - maybe she'll let me fire up a grill with the boys, to forget it all.
