Coneval said that the number of Mexicans living in poverty went from 51.9 million to 55.7 million. Mexico has a population of 126 million inhabitants.
Poverty in Mexico grew two percentage points between 2018 and 2020 to 43.9% of the population, said on Thursday the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval), the body that measures the indicator, while the country is recovering from the crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, which dragged the local economy to its worst performance in nearly a century.
Coneval said that the number of Mexicans living in poverty went from 51.9 million to 55.7 million. Mexico has a population of 126 million inhabitants.
In addition, the percentage of the population in extreme poverty also increased, going from 7% to 8.5% in the same period. The number of people in that situation reached 10.8 million in 2020.
“The health emergency caused by Covid-19 has deepened the challenges faced by social development policy in all areas, mainly in the income, health, education, and nutrition of the Mexican population,” Coneval said in a statement.
In terms of social deprivation, the biggest change between 2018 and 2020 was the 12 percentage point increase in the deficiency “for access to health services”, which went from 16.2% to 28.2%. The educational gap and access to nutritious and quality food also increased, although to a lesser extent.
Despite having shown a decrease between 2018 and 2020, the lack of access to social security is the item that presented the highest incidence in 2020, reaching 52% of the population.
In 2020, the Mexican economy fell by 8.5%, its largest contraction in almost 100 years, due to the devastating effect of the pandemic, which forced the authorities to suspend some activities to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
Source: coneval.org.mx
