The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) collected evidence through field missions and from other sources reporting on the situation in March, May and October 2022.
In parallel, it launched a large-scale online survey of those fleeing... Ukraine. This aimed to gather personal experiences of their journey to, arrival in and settling in the EU. The survey covered displaced people, including many children, in the 10 EU Member States hosting large numbers of people registered for temporary protection.
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Children continue to be exposed to powerful food marketing, which predominantly promotes foods high in saturated fatty acids, trans-fatty acids, free sugars and/or sodium and uses a wide variety of marketing strategies that are likely to appeal to <...span class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">children. Food marketing has a harmful impact on children’s food choice and their dietary intake, affects their purchase requests to adults for marketed foods and influences the development of their norms about food consumption. Food marketing is also increasingly recognized as a children’s rights concern, given its negative impact on several of the rights enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.This WHO guideline provides Member States with recommendations and implementation considerations on policies to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing, based on evidence specific to children and to the context of food marketing. Guidelines on other policies to improve the food environment are currently under development.
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Children with disabilities in South Africa: The hidden reality is part of a multiple-country study conducted by ACPF. The study seeks to analyse how cultural, social, physical and other societal barriers prevent ...edbox">children with disabilities from enjoying their constitutional rights to equality, freedom and human dignity. It also seeks to establish opportunities and practices that could be used to address these barriers to enhance disabled children’s participation in society.
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This policy paper underscores that, although children do not represent a high-risk group for direct COVID-19 fatality, the pandemic posts far-reaching secondary impacts that heighten risks to African child...ren’s rights and wellbeing.
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Listening to what children in crisis have to say is not only a moral and ethical responsibility for donor and humanitarian actors, it is also a humanitarian obligation. Children’...bute-to-highlight medbox">s right to participation is recognised in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the
Child (UNCRC), which provides rights for children to express their views and ‘be heard and taken seriously’.
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This document provides an overview of sexual and reproductive health and rights issues that may be important for the human rights, health and well-being of adolescents (aged 10–19 years) and the r...elevant World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines on how to address them in an easilyaccessible, user-friendly format. The document serves as a gateway to the rich body of WHO guidelines, and as a handy resource to inform advocacy, policy and programme/project design and research. It aims to support the implementation of the Global Strategy for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescents’ Health 2016–2030 (1), and is aligned with the WHO Global Accelerated Action for the Health of Adolescents (AA-HA!) as well as the WHO Operational Framework on Sexual Health and Its Linkages to Reproductive Health (2,3).
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Report on the symposium 26–28 May 2015, New Babylon Meeting Center, The Hague
The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela has been facing a prolonged socio-political and economic situation that has profoundly and negatively impacted social and health indicators. The COVID-19 pandemic further aggravated the humanitarian context in the
country, which stretched the limits of an alread...y weakened national health system. Violence and social conflicts, hyperinflation, constant political tensions, the persistence of migratory movements, and intensification of climate threats and natural hazards
have worsened the living conditions and health status of populations in vulnerable situations, including women, children, and indigenous people. A large influx of returnees back to Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of) marked the first
two years of the pandemic. However, the country’s continued deteriorating political, socio-economic, and human rights situation resulted in renewed increased migration of Venezuelans in 2022. The profile of Venezuelan migrants has progressively changed
over the years, from single men in search of better economic opportunities to families with women and children in situations of extreme vulnerability. The increasingly irregular and unsafe journeys of those migrants are constantly putting their lives at high risk
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Conflict, climate crisis and COVID-19 pose great threats to the health of women and children.
Rivercess, Liberia, April 25, 2024 - Liberia marks a monumental milestone in its battle against malaria
as it launches the highly anticipated RTS,S malaria vaccine today, coinciding with World Malaria Day,
commemorated under the theme: Health Equi...ty, Gender, and Human Rights: Accelerating the Fight
Against Malaria for a More Equitable World. The launch ceremony, held in Rivercess County, signals a
significant step forward in the nation's commitment to safeguarding the health of its children and
communities.
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Female genital mutilation (FGM), a violation of girls’ and women’s human rights, is becoming less common, and opposition to the practice is growing — in the last two decades, the proportion of... girls and women who want the practice to stop has doubled.
However, progress is not universal. In some countries, FGM is as common today as it was three decades ago. Even in places where the practice is on the decline, progress would need to be at least 10 times faster to meet the 2030 target for elimination. Additionally, an alarming trend is emerging: around 1 in 4 girls and women who have undergone FGM, or 52 million worldwide, were cut by health personnel. This proportion is twice as high among adolescents, indicating growth in the medicalization of the practice.
This brochure explores the global FGM trends — progress made in the past three decades, shifts in attitudes, and changes in the circumstances surrounding the practice.
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With the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) across Myanmar, many children and caregivers are required to stay in quarantine centres, in isolation and in hospitals, and special attention is needed to ensure ...x">children’s rights are protected in these settings. Violence, exploitation, abuse and neglect still occurs despite COVID-19 and continuity of the child protection case management system is essential to protect all children, including the most vulnerable. UNICEF’s Child Protection support focuses on mitigating the secondary impacts of physical distancing measures by ensuring children, parents and caregivers continue to have access to child protection services.
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Female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) refers to “all procedures involving partial or total removal of the female external genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.”1 FGM/C is a violation of girls’ and women’...>s human rights and is condemned by many international treaties and conventions, as well as by national legislation in many countries. Yet, where it is practised FGM/C is performed in line with tradition and social norms to ensure that girls are socially accepted and marriageable, and to uphold their status and honour and that of the entire family. UNICEF works with government and civil society partners towards the elimination of FGM/C in countries where it is still practised.
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Female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) refers to “all procedures involving partial
or total removal of the female external genitalia or other injury to the female
genital organs for non-medical reasons.”FGM/C is a violation of girls’ and women’...>s
human rights and is condemned by many international treaties and conventions, as
well as by national legislation in many countries.
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Fully functioning water, sanitation, hygiene (WASH) and health care waste management services are a critical aspect of infection prevention and control (IPC) practices, and ensuring patient safety and quality of care. Such services are also essential for creating an environment that supports the dig...nity and human rights of all care seekers, especially mothers, newborns, children and care providers.
WASH and waste services are also critical for preventing and effectively responding to disease outbreaks. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed gaps in these basic services (Box 1). These gaps threaten the safety of patients and caregivers, and have environmental consequences, especially as a result of large increases in plastic health care waste. In short, WASH is a critical foundation for improving quality across the health system (1).
Many facilities lack plans and budgets for WASH, which has impacts on IPC. This lack of services, and of systems to improve them, compromises the ability to provide safe and quality care, and places health care providers and those seeking care at substantial risk of infection and loss of dignity. Unhygienic health care facilities without drinking water or functional toilets are also a disincentive to seeking care and undermine staff morale – these factors can have a critical impact on controlling infectious disease outbreaks.
Climate change and its impacts on WASH and health services, gender-specific needs, and equity in service provision and management all require rigorous attention, adaptable tools and regular monitoring.
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Pregnancy and childbirth during adolescence profoundly affects the lives of millions of girls worldwide, and is a leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity, and infant and child mortality. Every year, an estimated 21 million girls aged 15–19 years old in low- and middle-income countries be...come pregnant, and approximately 12 million give birth.
For many adolescent girls, the ability to control their sexual lives remains limited. Long-standing gender inequalities and discrimination, marginalization, harmful social and gender norms, and denial of rights, compounded by poverty and violence, render them vulnerable to early pregnancy, HIV and other health threats. Lack of age-appropriate sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) information and services create additional barriers to care and support; as a result, adolescent girls who become pregnant are much more likely to go on to have rapid repeated births.
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In recognition that Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is not only a harmful practice but a violation of human rights, Kenya has adopted a robust legal framework. The country has ratified several international legal instruments that have become part of... the Kenyan law as provided for in Article 2 of the constitution.
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This brochure draws on data from more than 90 nationally representative surveys making it the most up-to-date compilation of statistics on FGM/C. Available data show that the practice of FGM/C is highly concentrated in a swath of countries from the Atlantic coast to the Horn of Africa, in areas of t...he Middle East such as Iraq and Yemen and in some countries in Asia like Indonesia. However, FGM/C is a human rights issue that affects girls and women worldwide. Evidence suggests that FGM/C exists in some places in South America such as Colombia and elsewhere in the world including in India, Malaysia, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
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- Twenty-two joint integrated rapid response mechanism (IRRM) missions were conducted in 11 counties and reached 305,887 people including 65,432 children under 5 years of age.
- UNICEF’s Inte...grated Community Mobilization Network reached 345,219 households (total population 2.1 million) advocating for child rights focused on child survival, birth notification, education and protection. Three million people have been reached with advocacy and life-saving messages through radio and community engagement activities, including activities focused on youth and faith leaders.
- On 27 June, discussions between President Salva Kiir and former First Vice President Riek Machar in Khartoum culminated in agreement to a permanent ceasefire and the opening of humanitarian corridors, effective 30 June.
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