STA, 29 May 2019 - Slovenia, Finland and Norway have placed third on the list of the safest countries for children to grow up in globally, according to NGO Save the Children's latest End of Childhood index, released on Tuesday.
Slovenia, always ranking very high by child safety, has thus slipped from the first place it shared last year with Singapore, which remains the world leader.
The index measures health and prosperity of children around the globe, taking into account nutrition, access to education, infant mortality, child marriages, child labour, teenage pregnancies and regional conflicts.
Slovenia recorded 0.5% of child marriages, slightly more than four teenage girls per 1,000 gave birth, and 2.8% of children did not go to school in 2013-2018.
Related: Primary, secondary and tertiary education in Slovenia
Save the Children said in the latest report The Many Faces of Exclusion the situation had improved from last year's report in 173 out of 176 countries.
Nevertheless, an estimated 690 million are still being denied a carefree childhood due to disease, death, child marriages, premature pregnancies and undernourishment.
However, this is an improvement on 2000, when the figure was put at 970 million, the report said.
The situation is worst in some African countries, whereas the best countries to grow up in are Singapore and Sweden in second place.
Except for Singapore and South Korea, the list of best-rated countries come from Europe. The US again placed 36th.
The charity's director Helle Thorning-Schmidt urged governments to do more to give every child the best possible start in life.
The full report can be seen here
