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Children and COVID-19 Research Library

UNICEF Innocenti's curated library of COVID-19 + Children research

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31 - 45 of 51
Pregnant and hungry: Addressing food insecurity in pregnant women during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in the United States

AUTHOR(S)
Cara D. Dolin; Charlene C. Compher; Jinhee K. Oh (et al.)

Published: April 2021   Journal: American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology
Food insecurity is a major social determinant of health impacting more than 10% of Americans. Social determinants of health are increasingly recognized as a driving force of health inequities. It is well established that food insecurity leads to adverse health outcomes outside of pregnancy such as obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and mental health problems. However, little is known about the impact of food insecurity during pregnancy on maternal and neonatal outcomes. Food insecurity and other social determinants of health are rarely addressed as part of routine obstetric care. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has only exacerbated the crisis of food insecurity across the country, disproportionally affecting women as well as racial and ethnic minorities. Women's health providers should implement universal screening for maternal food insecurity and offer resources to women struggling to feed themselves and their families. Reducing maternal health inequities in the US includes recognizing and addressing food insecurity, along with other social determinants of health, and advocating for public policies that support and protect all women's right to healthy food during pregnancy.
Adolescents’ experiences of covid-19 in Chittagong and Sylhet divisions, Bangladesh

AUTHOR(S)
Farhana Alam; Md Sajib Rana; Samira Ahmed Raha (et al.)

Institution: Gender and Adolescence Global Evidence
Published: April 2021

This study is part of a cross-country series designed to share emerging findings in real time from qualitative interviews with adolescents and school teachers in the context of covid-19. Our sample for this study was purposefully selected from an ongoing baseline GAGE impact evaluation study, and includes two cohorts: younger adolescents (10–14 years) and older adolescents (15–19 years), all of whom are in-school (grades 7 and 8). Adolescent respondents were drawn from both urban and rural schools in Chittagong and Sylhet divisions of Bangladesh. The objectives of the research are as follows: 1) to understand adolescents’ experiences of transition from childhood to adulthood, and to identify differences in their experiences by age, gender, disability and geographic location; 2) to identify adolescents’ knowledge of covid-19, and how the pandemic response has affected adolescent lives. To inform the pandemic response, this study aims to understand adolescents’ knowledge, perceptions and practices during the covid-19 pandemic, their challenges and worries, and the coping mechanisms they are using to deal with the evolving situation.

Sub-Saharan Africa: growing up in crisis in a world of opportunities: the lasting impact of Covid-19 on children
Institution: *UNICEF
Published: April 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound effect on the world’s population. Although it has been established that children are at lower risk of falling seriously ill with COVID-19, the pandemic has had, and continues to have, far-reaching effects on them. The pandemic poses a health crisis that has become a child rights’ crisis. It is heightening the impact of conflict and climate change on children. In sub-Saharan Africa, COVID-19 is exacerbating not only existing threats to the future that 550 million children face, but also measures put in place to control and contain the disease. While the arrival of the first vaccines brings hope to put an end to the pandemic, it will take time before these vaccines can reach everyone who needs them. This report sheds light on the various ways children in sub-Saharan Africa have been affected by the ongoing pandemic and how UNICEF and partners have been supporting them. The report also is a call to action to governments and the international community to take concerted action to mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated control measures, and build forward a better world fit for children.

COVID-19 and the Looming Debt Crisis: Protecting and Transforming Social Spending for Inclusive Recoveries

Compounding the COVID-19 pandemic is a looming debt crisis for low- and middle-income countries where a growing debt burden threatens to crowd out social spending for children.

This policy brief explores whether the current support from the international community is enough to maintain spending on basic services during COVID-19. It highlights countries that are most at risk due to high levels of poverty, as well as those less likely to benefit from the G20 Debt Standstill (DSSI). It concludes that a new international debt restructuring architecture, which encompasses the needs of poorer countries, is crucial to protecting children’s rights in the wake of COVID-19. 

Revisiting the impact of covid-19 on adolescents in urban slums in Dhaka, Bangladesh: round 2

AUTHOR(S)
Samira Ahmed Raha; Md. Sajib Rana; Saklain Al Mamun Al Mamun (et al.)

Institution: Gender and Adolescence Global Evidence
Published: March 2021

This research is part of the Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence (GAGE) programme, a nine-year, mixed methods longitudinal research and evaluation programme following the lives of 20,000 adolescents in six low- and middle-income countries. BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health (BRAC JPGSPH) and the BRAC Institute of Governance and Development (BIGD) partnered to carry out rapid-response research in Dhaka to gain an understanding of vulnerable and underprivileged adolescents’ lives during the pandemic. This policy brief presents findings from the second round of data collection which included 30 in-depth interviews with adolescents living in three sites in Dhaka. Findings show inequalities in access to and continuation of distance education, negative effects in psychosocial well-being, unequal access to digital connectivity, financial constraints, with inequalities between different socio-economic classes, gender and age groups, which put them at risk of discontinuing education, entering into child labour and also early marriage.

Working children in crisis-hit Lebanon: exploring the linkages between food insecurity and child labour
Food insecurity has increased significantly in Lebanon during the past year; nearly 97% of the Syrian refugees on Lebanese soil are marginally or completely food insecure. Food basednegative coping mechanisms have also increased and infant and young child feeding practices have deteriorated. Food is the main expenditure for the most vulnerable households. According to the last available figure on this topic (2016), at least 100,000 children were working in Lebanon and this trend is expected increase. The objective of this report is to draw attention to the linkage between food insecurity and child labour, and its recent evolution in Lebanon. ACF and IRC developed questionnaires and interviewed 648 individuals between July and September 2020 in the Bekaa, Beirut, North and South Lebanon. The interviewees were mostly Syrian refugees but also Lebanese individuals and working children were included. The survey findings were complemented by existing research findings from NRC and CAMEALEON and data from the Lebanon Protection Consortium (LPC).
Direct and indirect effects of COVID-19 pandemic and response in South Asia

Over recent decades, South Asia has made remarkable progress in improving the health of mothers and children. But the year 2020 brought a great shock to South Asia, as it did to the whole world. The COVID-19 pandemic has had major and multiple impacts – both direct and indirect. One of the critical indirect impacts has been severe disruptions to the delivery and use of routine services, including essential health and nutrition services. The region saw significant drops in the use of both preventive and curative services. Direct and Indirect Effects of COVID-19 Pandemic and Response in South Asia uses a series of exercises based on actual observed changes in services and intervention coverage to model impacts on mortality, hospitalizations, and ICU admissions due to COVID-19. It also models the impact of nationwide stay-at-home orders to curb the spread of COVID-19 on maternal and child mortality, educational attainment of children, and the region’s economy. The study focuses on South Asia’s six most populous countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka and makes the case for interventions and strategies to minimise these indirect consequences.

COVID-19 and the Looming Debt Crisis: Protecting and Transforming Social Spending for Inclusive Recoveries

Compounding the COVID-19 pandemic is a looming debt crisis for low- and middle-income countries where a growing debt burden threatens to crowd out social spending for children.

This policy brief explores whether the current support from the international community is enough to maintain spending on basic services during COVID-19. It highlights countries that are most at risk due to high levels of poverty, as well as those less likely to benefit from the G20 Debt Standstill (DSSI). It concludes that a new international debt restructuring architecture, which encompasses the needs of poorer countries, is crucial to protecting children’s rights in the wake of COVID-19. 

Best of UNICEF Research and Evaluation 2020

Evidence and objective assessment are needed more than ever to help enhance the rights and well-being of the world’s children. Researching the changing world around us and evaluating progress are two sides of the same coin, both critical to reimagining a better future for children. In recognition of this, UNICEF celebrates and showcases innovative and influential research and evaluations from our offices around the world every year. For 2020, Innocenti and the Evaluation Office joined forces to find the most rigorous UNICEF studies with greatest influence on policies and programmes that benefit children.

Adolescents’ experiences of covid-19 and the public health response in urban Dhaka, Bangladesh

AUTHOR(S)
Erin Oakley; Sarah Baird; Mohammad Ashraful Haque (et al.)

Institution: Gender and Adolescence Global Evidence
Published: October 2020
This fact sheet is a rapid snapshot of adolescents’ knowledge and attitudes towards covid-19 and presents key findings on the impact of covid-19 across GAGE’s capability domains: education and learning; health, nutrition, and sexual and reproductive health; psychosocial well-being; economic empowerment; voice and agency; and bodily integrity. This factsheet presents findings from GAGE’s ongoing longitudinal survey in Dhaka, Bangladesh, one of the most densely populated cities in the world, which follows 780 boys and girls in two cohorts (ages 10–12 and 15–17 at baseline in 2017). These adolescents come from three sites in Dhaka, including two peri-urban slum areas and one low income settlement in Dhaka.
Protecting essential health services in low-income and middle-income countries and humanitarian settings while responding to the COVID-19 pandemic

AUTHOR(S)
Karl Blanchet; Ala Alwan; Caroline Antoine (et al.)

Published: October 2020

In health outcomes terms, the poorest countries stand to lose the most from these disruptions. In this paper, we make the case for a rational approach to public sector health spending and decision making during and in the early recovery phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on ethics and equity principles, it is crucial to ensure that patients not infected by COVID-19 continue to get access to healthcare and that the services they need continue to be resourced. We present a list of 120 essential non-COVID-19 health interventions that were adapted from the model health benefit packages developed by the Disease Control Priorities project.

Adolescents’ experiences of covid-19 and the public health response in urban Ethiopia

AUTHOR(S)
Sarah Baird; Joan Hamory; Nicola Jones (et al.)

Institution: Gender and Adolescence Global Evidence
Published: September 2020
This factsheet provides a rapid snapshot of adolescents’ knowledge and attitudes towards covid-19 in Ethiopia and presents key findings on the impact of covid-19 across GAGE’s six focal capability domains: education and learning; health, nutrition, and sexual and reproductive health; psychosocial well-being; economic empowerment; voice and agency; and bodily integrity.
‘People won’t die due to the disease; they will die due to hunger’: exploring the impacts of covid-19 on Rohingya and Bangladeshi adolescents in Cox’s Bazar

AUTHOR(S)
Silvia Guglielmi; Jennifer Seager; Khadija Mitu (et al.)

Institution: Gender and Adolescence Global Evidence
Published: August 2020
In order to inform the Bangladeshi government’s response and that of its humanitarian and development partners in Cox’s Bazar, it is essential to supplement the existing evidence base with a focus on adolescent girls and boys, given the likelihood that containment measures will have multidimensional effects on young people’s well-being in the short and medium term. This policy brief draws on virtual research findings carried out with adolescent girls and boys in May and June 2020 and also presents priority policy and programming implications.
Changes of physical activity and ultra-processed food consumption in adolescents from different countries during Covid-19 pandemic: an observational study

AUTHOR(S)
María Belén Ruíz-Roso; Patricia de Carvalho Padilha; Diana C. Matilla-Escalante (et al.)

Published: July 2020   Journal: Nutrients
This study aims to describe physical activity and ultra-processed foods consumption, their changes and sociodemographic predictors among adolescents from countries in Europe (Italy and Spain) and Latin America (Brazil, Chile, and Colombia) during the SARS-CoV-2-pandemic period. It is across-sectional study via web survey. International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) and weekly ultra-processed food consumption data were used. To compare the frequencies of physical activity status with sociodemographic variables, a multinomial logistic and a multiple logistic regression for habitual ultra-processed foods was performed.
UNHCR and WFP warn refugees in Africa face hunger and malnutrition as COVID-19 worsens food shortages
UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, and the World Food Programme (WFP) are warning that severe underfunding, conflict and disasters – as well as supply chain challenges, rising food prices and loss of income due to COVID19 - threaten to leave millions of refugees across Africa without food.
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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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Check our quarterly thematic digests on children and COVID-19

Each quarterly thematic digest features the latest evidence drawn from the Children and COVID-19 Research Library on a particular topic of interest.
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COVID-19 & Children: Rapid Research Response

UNICEF Innocenti is mobilizing a rapid research response in line with UNICEF’s global response to the COVID-19 crisis. The initiatives we’ve begun will provide the broad range of evidence needed to inform our work to scale up rapid assessment, develop urgent mitigating strategies in programming and advocacy, and preparation of interventions to respond to the medium and longer-term consequences of the COVID-19 crisis. The research projects cover a rapid review of evidence, education analysis, and social and economic policies.