In times of conflict, war, poverty or religious fundamentalism, women and children are the first and most numerous victims. Women need all their courage today.

Allende links large-scale social crises—armed conflict, economic deprivation, and religious extremism—to a predictable human cost borne disproportionately by the vulnerable. The first sentence stresses both immediacy (“first”) and scale (“most numerous”), underscoring how women and children are targeted, displaced, impoverished, or subjected to violence when institutions collapse. The second sentence pivots from diagnosis to moral exhortation: women are not only victims but also agents who must summon courage to survive, protect families, and resist oppressive systems. The quote functions as a feminist humanitarian warning, insisting that any serious response to crisis must center gendered impacts rather than treating them as secondary effects.