8 million

The estimated number of children under the age of 18 who lost a parent or primary caregiver between Jan. 1, 2020, and May 1, 2022, to a pandemic-related cause, a large increase from a previous estimate that just 5.2 million children lost a parent or caregiver due to COVID-19 from the beginning of the pandemic to Oct. 31, 2021. Experts attribute the increase partly to the fact that COVID-related deaths continue to occur and partly because health experts have gotten more accurate death data as the pandemic continues.