Children and COVID-19 Research Library

COVID-19 is likely to have negatively impacted foster families but few data sources are available to confirm this. The current study used Reddit social media data to examine how foster families are faring in the pandemic. Discussion topics were identified and examined for changes before and after COVID-19. Comments were collected from three Reddit online discussion boards dedicated to foster families (N = 11,830).

Risk factors for child abuse and neglect and commonly used reporting mechanisms were highly affected by SARS-Cov-2 pandemic; yet, little is known about the effects of SARS-Cov-2 on rates of child abuse and neglect. To compare overall rates, demographics, types of abuse and acuity of child abuse and neglect encounters seen at one university health system for the 6 months before and after school closings due to the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic. Data was extracted from a database of billed ICD10 codes for child abuse and neglect including sexual abuse codes. There were 579 encounters for patients <18 years of age and 476 unique patients.

COVID-19 has had a major impact on child abuse and neglect (CAN) in the U.S. leading to a change in the number of reported screened-in CAN investigations, missed prevention cases, and missed CAN cases. To estimate the deficit number of CAN investigations and resultant estimated number of missed prevention and CAN cases due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S. from March 2020 to December 2020.

The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has changed the lives of children and parents, raising concerns about child maltreatment. This study examined the prevalence of abusive parenting behavior during the pandemic of the COVID-19 and its relations with physical, psychological, and social factors and positive parenting behavior. An online survey was performed during the COVID-19 state of emergency in Japan. Participants were 5344 parents of children aged 0–17 years.

Child burns rank among the most frequent domestic accidents in France. COVID-19 lockdown between March 16th and May 11th of 2020 increased time spent at home by children. This retrospective, observational study described the epidemiological impact of COVID-19 lockdown on child burns in a pediatric surgery department compared with previous five years. Child burns in the previous five years constituted the “before COVID-19 group” as the reference group. Child burns during the first lockdown formed the “COVID-19 group”. Demographics characteristics, the delay before first attendance at the surgery department, burns characteristics, the place of the incident, need of skin graft, and child reactions to trauma or isolation were recorded for these two groups.

Little is known about the exposure of youth with disability to cyber victimisation. This study aims to estimate the prevalence of peer cyber and non-cyber victimisation in a nationally representative sample of 14-year-old adolescents with and without disability and to determine whether gender moderates the relationship between disability and exposure to victimisation. Secondary analysis of data collected in Wave 6 of the UK's Millennium Cohort Survey on 11,726 14-year-old adolescents living in the UK.

Physical child abuse affects 9 in every 1,000 children in the United States and associated traumatic injuries are often identified by the healthcare system. The COVID-19 pandemic has intensified risk factors for physical child abuse and increased avoidance of the healthcare system. This study examined the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on presentation and severity of physical child abuse. A retrospective, cross-sectional study utilizing the Pediatric Health Information System was performed. An interrupted time series analysis estimated the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the number of children <15 years old presenting with physical child abuse to children's hospitals from March 1st to June 30th of 2020 by comparing to those presenting during the same period for years 2016-2019. Hierarchical regression models estimated the effect of the pandemic on likelihood of operative intervention, ICU admission, traumatic brain injury, and mortality.