Explosive Weapons Now Top Threat to Children in War Zones

On 10 October 2025, thousands of Palestinian families are moving along the coastal road back to northern Gaza, amid the extreme devastation of infrastructure.

Recently, global conflicts have grown increasingly brutal, with deaths and injuries caused by explosive weapons now surpassing those from previous leading causes such as malnutrition, disease, and lack of healthcare services. As these conflicts intensify, children continue to bear the brunt of casualties, while impunity for perpetrators persists and funding gaps exacerbate the lack of critical protection services.

On 20 November, Save the Children issued a report titled Children and Blast Injuries: The Devastating Impact of Explosive Weapons on Children, 2020–2025, detailing the intensifying threat of explosive weapons to children across 11 contemporary world conflicts. Drawing on clinical studies and field research, the report examines the impact of pediatric blast injuries in healthcare settings and calls on the international community to prioritise investment in prevention and recovery efforts.

“Children are paying the highest price in today’s wars—not only at the hands of armed groups, but also through the actions of governments that should be protecting them,” said Narmina Strishenets, the report’s lead author and Senior Conflict and Humanitarian Advocacy Advisor at Save the Children UK. “Missiles are falling where children sleep, play, and learn—turning the very places that should be the safest, like their homes and schools, into death traps. Actions once condemned by the international community and met with global outrage are now brushed aside as the ‘cost of war.’ That moral surrender is one of the most dangerous shifts of our time.”

The report highlights the precarious conditions in which children in war zones live. Children are uniquely vulnerable to injuries from explosive weapons, as their bodies are far less developed and resilient than adults. Additionally, healthcare, rehabilitation, and psychosocial support services are underfunded and often designed with adults in mind, leaving children disproportionately without access to adequate, child-specific care.

Figures from Save the Children show that children are far more likely to succumb to blast injuries than adults, particularly from head, torso, and burn injuries. Children under seven are roughly twice as likely to suffer from life-limiting brain trauma. Furthermore, approximately 65–70 percent of injured children sustain severe burns to multiple parts of their bodies.

“Children are far more vulnerable to explosive weapons than adults. Their anatomy, physiology, behaviour, and psychosocial needs make them disproportionately affected,” said Dr Paul Reavley, a consultant pediatric emergency physician and co-founder of the Pediatric Blast Injury Partnership, a collaborative effort between medical personnel and Save the Children UK.

Reavley added, “Many do not survive to reach hospital, and those who do face a higher risk of death than adult civilians in any health system. They often suffer multiple severe injuries requiring complex treatment and lifelong care. Yet most health responses to conflict are designed for adults, overlooking children’s distinct needs. Survivors face chronic pain, disability, psychological trauma, and stigma that can last a lifetime.”

According to the report, explosive weapons are causing unprecedented harm to children as wars increasingly move toward densely populated urban areas, accounting for a record 70 percent of nearly 12,000 children killed or injured in conflict zones last year. More than 70 percent of child deaths and injuries in war zones in 2024 resulted from explosive weapons, up from 59 percent between 2020–2024.

Save the Children identified five key factors driving this increase: the rise of new technologies that amplify destruction, the normalization of civilian harm in military operations, widespread lack of accountability, unprecedented severity of child casualties, and long-term social costs of explosive violence.

The deadliest conflicts for children in 2024, based on deaths and life-threatening injuries, were the occupied Palestinian territory (2,917 children), Sudan (1,739), Myanmar (1,261), Ukraine (671), and Syria (670). The majority of these casualties were caused by explosive weapons. Additionally, children account for roughly 43 percent of all casualties from mines and other unexploded ordnance, which have plagued farmland, schools, and homes worldwide for decades.

In the last two years, Save the Children has recorded a “dangerous erosion of protection norms” for children in conflict zones, with funding shortfalls and the scaling back of civilian harm mitigation and response mechanisms endangering millions of children globally. Of the USD 1 billion pledged to mine action in 2023, only half was directed toward clearance efforts, 6 percent toward healthcare services for victims, and only 1 percent toward mine risk education.

Save the Children is urging world leaders to stop using explosive weapons in populated areas, strengthen policies to protect children in conflict, and invest in support, research, and recovery for children affected by blast injuries.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and its partners are working on the frontlines to provide essential services that promote and protect children’s health, survival, and development, including access to food, shelter, healthcare, and social support. UNICEF is also rehabilitating water and sanitation systems, distributing cash transfers to displaced families, and providing mental health support and education for children in conflict zones.

UNICEF additionally supports survivors of explosive weapons-related violence through medical treatment, prosthetics, and psychosocial support services. The agency is also collaborating with governments and civil society groups to strengthen protection services, particularly for children living with disabilities.