Additional Facts

• 80% of the population lives on $0.30 a day.
• 75% of the population is undernurished according to the UN.
• There are an estimated 1.3 million displaced people in the DRC.
• UNAIDS estimates that 1.1 million Congolese are living with HIV/AIDS.
• In 2005, a Doctors without Borders report stated, "DRC holds the sad world record for mother-child mortality with 1,289 deaths per 100,000 live births, which represents a loss each year of 585,000 children. The mortality rates for under-fives are around 213 deaths per 1,000 live births. This means that one in five newborn Congolese children will never reach the age of five years. Among the under-fives, 30% of deaths are caused by malaria, which claims the lives of 300,000 children each year."
• A 2002 UN report on the eastern province of Ituri estimated that 50,000 people may have been killed in Ituri alone since 1999. Central to the conflict in Ituri is control over gold deposits.
• In Bunia, the main city of Ituri, Doctors without Borders, reports that while 40 girls and women who have been raped seek help each week, there are many who are unable to come due to the high levels of violence.
• Close to two-thirds of the population in the DRC cannot afford conventional health care.