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AUTHOR(S) Deepika Ganju; Tom Pellens
AUTHOR(S) Kalpana Vincent; Viviane Bianco; Sarah Fuller (et al.)
Protecting children from COVID-19 in school requires an effort from the entire community, including national and local governments, school administrators, teachers, parents/caregivers and students. To reopen schools as safely as possible and keep them open during the COVID-19 pandemic, consistent implementation of effective strategies to prevent COVID-19 transmission during all school-related activities is critical. This guide outlines practical tips to support school administrators in implementing safety measures and creating a safer learning environment for children. The decision to reopen schools should be guided by the best interests of children and the guidance of the local government and public health authorities in each country.
This sub-regional situational analysis provides a snapshot of the educational responses and effects of COVID-19 across East Asia based on a comprehensive desk-review of qualitative and quantitative evidence, complemented by key informant interviews with relevant education officials, local authorities and teachers across three countries in the sub-region (Indonesia, Lao PDR and Viet Nam).
One of the objectives of this collaboration is to produce a range of youth-led, data-driven research products, providing insight into the most effective ways to support young people in East Africa. This special edition Barometer is designed to provide a snapshot into the lives of Kenyan girls aged 15-19 (also referred to as adolescent girls) in 2021. This edition of COVID-19 Barometer includes new insights from Shujaaz Inc’s annual national youth survey, which draws on face-to-face interviews with 2,015 young people conducted between December 2020 and January 2021. Drawing on additional qualitative research, the Barometer aims to provide an update on the challenges, lifestyles, priorities and aspirations of adolescent girls, during a turbulent pandemic. This edition focuses on key topics including education, sexual and reproductive health, financial security, mental wellbeing and resilience. We hope it provides a valuable update for organisations working with adolescent girls across Kenya, and inspiration for similar research in East and Southern African countries.
AUTHOR(S) Joel Mullan; Emma Broadbent; Bassem Nasir (et al.)
Technology is playing a growing role to provide education, training and employment, including in humanitarian and migration responses. By driving a shift to online work and training on an unprecedented scale, albeit not universally, the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly accelerated the use of digital technologies in programmes that support school-to-work transition, including solutions focused on youth who are FDPs, in host communities, or are otherwise vulnerable. This report, funded in part by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands’ PROSPECTS partnership, provides an overview of how digital technologies are being used to support youth’s transition from school to work, ‘learning to earning’, in displaced and host communities. Based on a rapid analysis of emerging approaches and lessons in this burgeoning space, the report’s purpose is to inspire concerted attention and action to ensure effectiveness and scale of such digital enablers.
AUTHOR(S) Jan Beise; Danzhen You (et al.)
Age plays a critical role in a child’s migration, but how will gender mediate that experience? Which gender-specific vulnerabilities, needs, and opportunities influence the lives of girls and boys on the move? This report reviews the existing evidence base – official statistics and quantitative and qualitative studies from the community level to the global level – to shed light on these important questions. Examining the available information not only indicates where and how children on the move need targeted resources, support and protection, but also pinpoints areas needing further investigation. Available data and research demonstrate that gender plays a pivotal role from the time the decision to leave home is made, and continues to shape experiences and vulnerabilities throughout the child’s journey and integration process at the destination. COVID-19 has added another layer of complexity to the lives of children on the move, exacerbating pre-existing insecurities in some dimensions and introducing new ones. Girls in particular are feeling many of these effects acutely, such as gender-based violence.
AUTHOR(S) Laetitia Antonowicz; Parmosivea Soobrayan; Sarah Fuller
Education has been significantly disrupted in Europe and Central Asia due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Unequal access to and varied quality of remote and hybrid learning during the first 18 months of the pandemic have slowed students’ learning and widened equity gaps between students. The pandemic has also significantly impacted the well-being and mental health of students, teachers and parents. UNICEF has advocated for schools to be among the last institutions to close and the first to reopen when it is safe to do so and has called for joint coordination across sectors and partners to keep schools open and children, teachers and families safe. This document, Building resilient education systems beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic: Second set of considerations for school reopening, aims to support education decision-makers at national, local and school levels to plan for education recovery and normalisation following the 2020 school closures and continuing education disruption in 2021. It provides a set of considerations to address the most pressing priorities and mitigate the most significant risks to ensure that all children and young people participate in high-quality, inclusive and safe learning. The Considerations apply to access, learning, well-being, safety in schools and nutrition.
AUTHOR(S) JohnBaptist Bwanika; Tom Pellens; Esther Kaggwa
While there has been a global rush to generate rapid evidence on COVID-19 mental health impacts among adults, limited evidence exists on the potential impacts on children. This is the protocol for our rapid review that seeks to (i) understand the immediate impact of COVID-19’s first wave on the mental health of children and adolescents (0–19 years); and (ii) apply lessons learned from this pandemic to mitigate the impacts of future health crises.
AUTHOR(S) Lorraine Sherr; Lucie Cluver; Mark Tomlinson (et al.)
AUTHOR(S) Elena Camilletti; Tara Patricia Cookson; Zahrah Nesbitt-Ahmed (et al.)
The importance of mainstreaming gender into social protection policies and programmes is increasingly recognized. However, evidence on the extent to which this is actually happening remains limited. This report contributes to filling this evidence gap by drawing on the findings of two complementary research projects undertaken by UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti and UN Women in 2019. Using a specifically developed analytical framework, these two projects reviewed 50 national social protection strategies and 40 social protection programmes across a total of 74 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to assess the extent to which they incorporate gender equality concerns.
This year’s The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) summarizes the first global assessment of food insecurity and malnutrition for 2020 and offers some indication of what hunger and malnutrition would look like by 2030, in a scenario further complicated by the enduring effects of the pandemic. Nearly one-tenth of the world population – up to 811 million people went hungry in 2020. After remaining virtually unchanged for five years, world hunger increased last year. Further, it is projected that around 660 million people may still face hunger in 2030, 30 million more people than in a scenario in which the pandemic had not occurred, due to lasting effects of COVID-19 on global food security. The setback makes the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goal for zero hunger and ending all forms of malnutrition more challenging. The report indicates that progress has been made for some forms of malnutrition, but the world is not on track to achieve any global nutrition targets by 2030. Globally, 44 percent of infants under 6 months of age were exclusively breastfed in 2019 – up from 37 percent in 2012 but the practice varies considerably among regions. Child malnutrition still persists at an alarming rate –an estimated 149 million children were stunted, 45 million were wasted and 39 million were overweight in 2020. The report presents new projections of potential additional cases of child stunting and wasting due to COVID-19. Based on a conservative scenario, it is projected that an additional 22 million children in low- and middle-income countries will be stunted, an additional 40 million will be wasted between 2020 and 2030 due to the pandemic. Comprehensive and urgent efforts are required to address the detrimental effects of the pandemic and achieve the 2030 global targets.
Since the first identified case on 2 March 2020 until 13 July 2021, more than 1,200 people have lost their lives, meaning that too many boys and girls suffered the tragic and permanent loss of a grandparent, parent, caregiver or loved one. More than 46,860 persons tested positive, implying that and even greater number of loved ones might have fallen ill, making it hard for them to care for family, keep plans or sustain employment. Meanwhile, almost every household in Senegal was affected by restrictions designed to contain the first wave. While the strict measures were largely successful in limiting the spread of the virus, they also affected key sectors of the economy, disrupted supply chains and markets, and affected both the demand for, and availability of, social services. Essentially, COVID-19 impacted almost every aspect of life, particularly in the first quarter of 2020, which we now recognize as the first “leg” in a multi-year, planet-wide marathon to outpace the pandemic. With the closure of schools and disruption of many basic services, child protection mechanisms also lapsed, triggering a crisis for children with considerable socio-economic costs.
At the height of nationwide lockdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 150 million children younger than 5 years in East Asia and the Pacific were affected. The pandemic brought service provision for young children in many of the 27 countries supported by UNICEF programmes that promote nurturing care and are essential to their optimal development to a standstill. Yet, even before the pandemic, more than 42 million children in the region were at risk of not reaching their developmental potential. Using the latest available evidence, this report summarizes the impact of the pandemic on services essential for young children’s development: For example, that the number of children younger than 5 years visiting community health centres in Viet Nam dropped by 48 per cent; that in Indonesia, more than 50 per cent of households reported not being able to meet their family’s nutritional needs; or that in the Philippines, more than 80 per cent of households experienced a decrease in their household income. Households facing disadvantages before COVID-19 – those with young children, those living in rural and remote areas and low-income households – are in most cases more disproportionally affected by the pandemic.
This report released by UNICEF and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), provides concrete recommendations for actions that businesses can take to help address the “skills mismatch” that young people all over the world are encountering. Based on combined insights from WBCSD’s Future of Work project and UNICEF’s programming and research experience in the area of education, the “Empowering the Workforce of Tomorrow: The role of Business in Tackling the Skills Mismatch among Youth” report highlights the scale of the skills mismatch challenge globally, its root causes and the impacts it has on youth, business and society more broadly. Young people in particular are being disproportionately affected by these disruptions. All over the world, hundreds of millions of individuals are coming of age and finding themselves unemployed and unemployable, lacking the right skills to take up the jobs available today and, even more, the skills that will be needed tomorrow.
UNICEF Innocenti's Children and COVID-19 Library is a database collecting research from around the world on COVID-19 and its impacts on children and adolescents.
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