Work

No excuses - improving child public health outcomes in humanitarian settings requires reliable data

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: Advances in medical and public health knowledge and technology have supported extraordinary improvements in humankind's ability to understand, diagnose, treat, and cure diseases and health conditions.These advances have been dependent upon well-constructed public health interventions, which have in turn relied on data to inform priorities, intervention design, monitoring, and evaluation.This paper argues that public health interventions for children in humanitarian settings can and should be made using sound evidence.Beginning with a brief overview of child public health (Box 1) [1], we review the main challenges to collecting child public health data in humanitarian settings.We argue that actors delivering interventions for children and actors involved in data collection hold a moral responsibility to measure the impacts of their activities on children, and we provide some suggestions for the way forward based on a recent scoping review of child public health indicators in fragile, conflict-affected, and vulnerable (FCV) settings [2]. Child public health -a useful approach to improve interventions for children in humanitarian settingsBy its nature, child public health includes a range of disciplines focused on, related to, or impacting children's and young people's health.The importance of including the perspectives, views, and priorities of children and young people is considered an essential component of child public health work.It is not only the right thing to do, but also necessary to meaningfully understand and effectively respond to their needs.Child public health provides a perspective that can allow us to see children in the context of their lives and consider what this means for their health status, risks, and needs both in the present and as they grow. PLOS GLObaL PubLic HeaLtHNo excuses -improving child public health outcomes in humanitarian

Source: PLOS Global Public Health

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0004231

Authors: Ayesha Kadir, Amy J. Stevens, Paul H. Wise, Rudzani Muloiwa

Institutions: Regionshospitalet Viborg, Stanford Medicine, Stanford University, University of Cape Town, Red Cross War Memorial Children's Hospital

Language: English

Topic: Health and Conflict Studies

Subfield: General Health Professions

Field: Health Professions

Domain: Health Sciences

SDGs: Good health and well-being, Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,496