U.N. Women says aid cuts have cut off support for millions of women

U.N. Women found that at least 1 million women and girls lost access to life-saving support over the past year as donor aid cuts forced women’s organizations to scale back shelter, health care and protection services. The agency’s latest survey found that 855 organizations in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti and other crisis-hit countries are already under pressure, with 40% saying they are at risk of shutting down temporarily or permanently within the next year.

U.N. Women found that 60% of the organizations surveyed were already reaching fewer women and girls than they did before January 2025, while nearly nine in 10 said they could not meet the needs they were seeing on the ground. Roughly 120 million women and girls worldwide need humanitarian assistance and protection, leaving local groups to confront rising demand with shrinking budgets.

The shortfall stems from a broader retreat by major donors, including the Trump administration’s decision to slash billions of dollars in foreign assistance this year, alongside tighter aid budgets elsewhere as governments face fiscal pressure and shift money toward defence. For frontline groups, the cuts have meant fewer shelter beds for survivors of domestic violence, fewer reproductive-health services for women in crisis zones and weaker protection programs for displaced families and others who often have nowhere else to turn.

In March 2025, a rapid global survey of 411 organizations across 44 countries found that 90% had been financially affected and nearly half expected to shut down within six months. Women’s organizations working with refugees, LGBTIQ+ people, women with disabilities and Indigenous communities faced rising violence and harmful coping strategies such as child marriage and survival sex.

By October 2025, a separate survey of 428 women’s rights and civil society organizations found that nearly 90% had seen severe reductions in women’s and girls’ access to essential services. Almost a quarter had halted prevention programmes, and only 5% thought they could sustain current operations for two years or longer. U.N. Women estimated global aid cuts at USD 78 billion.

By January 2026, the Women’s Refugee Commission found that women were dying in childbirth, millions of survivors of gender-based violence had lost access to lifesaving care and thousands of girls had dropped out of school after the United States cut humanitarian funding in 2025. In May 2025, U.N. Women’s chief of humanitarian action, Sofia Calltorp, warned that many women-led organizations were already on the brink, with gender-based violence, protection and livelihoods services beginning to shut down.