#HealthForAll #FutureChild

The recently published ‘A Future for the World’s Children? A WHO-UNICEF-Lancet Commission’ is a major report on child health and well-being, culminating in a call for action to help achieve positive results for children across the globe. The report encourages the wider society, as well as government organisations, to put children and young people at the heart of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

“... To ensure our children grow and flourish, we require timely and accurate population data on health, nutrition, educational access and performance, housing, and environmental security, among other entitlements. Harnessing the power of citizen accountability mechanisms will be essential to fill the data gaps. We also propose the development of user-friendly country dashboards to assess the effects on children's wellbeing and sustainable development. Given the urgency for action, regular reports on the SDGs to the UN General Assembly must be the anchor of strong advocacy on action for children everywhere….”

Key messages from the report are:

1.      The health and rights of children and adolescents are under threat, from issues such as climate change, polluted air, mass marketing of harmful products (e.g. sugar, fast food, alcohol and tobacco), displacement, conflict and inequality

2.      Investing in children’s health, development and environment now is an investment for the future

3.      We should all strive to join the global movement to put child and adolescent health and well-being at the core of the SDGs

4.      We need unified action today to best promote children’s health and protect their rights

5.      Meaningful youth engagement is critical in decision making about policies that will affect their future. We need to invest in children by ensuring that their voices are heard

We all have a role to play in creating a future for the world’s children. Here at the Data for Children Collaborative, we are committed to pursuing projects that have positive impacts for children across multiple key domains. With all of our projects aiming to hit one or more SDG targets, we really do put children and their rights at the core of what we do. Our global network and collaborative approach means that we are engaging with governments and other organisations to achieve this goal and promote this vision.

The report also focuses on the very real and current threat of climate change, and the devastating impact this could have for the future of the world’s children. At the Collaborative, we recognise the multi-faceted effects of climate change for children, and are currently in the process of carrying out a topic-mapping exercise under this theme. In doing so, we hope to identify key themes and gaps in current research that can inform our next projects. 

Click here if you would like to read the report.

To explore and interact with the findings, please click here.