According to UNESCO, gender parity in primary and secondary enrolment has been reached at the global level, and around 50 million more girls are in school than in 2015. The average hides big gaps: in some regions girls are still clearly disadvantaged, while in others it is boys who drop out more. Even so, the progress is historic.
That's the estimate from a WHO-led study published in The Lancet in 2024, covering the half-century since the Expanded Programme on Immunization was launched in 1974. It works out to about six lives saved every minute, mostly infants. The measles vaccine alone accounts for around 60% of those lives.
According to the World Gold Council, about 216,000 tonnes of gold have been mined in all of human history. Because gold is so dense (19.3 tonnes per cubic metre), it would fit in a cube about 22 metres on each side, roughly the height of a seven-storey building. Strikingly, about two-thirds of it has been mined since 1950.