COVID-19 and Preventing Harm to Vulnerable Children

Although COVID-19 mercifully seems to affect children less severely than adults, children are far from immune from the impacts of the virus. Public health orders closing schools and businesses, cancelling events, and keeping children at home have been disruptive and distressing to many children and families. But for children who rely on government entities for protection, care, custody, and services, the effects of the public health orders can be devastating. COVID-19 and the response to it has serious implications for the safety, well-being, and development of these vulnerable children—those within the child welfare, juvenile justice, and special education systems. All three groups consist of children to whom the state has legal obligations. Additionally, all three groups consist disproportionately of children of color, a reality being brought to the forefront in the context of this pandemic and beyond. As these child-serving systems adapt to the new realities defined by public health limitations, there exists an opportunity to address both immediate challenges as well as enduring concerns within these complex structures. This Article explores the current state of child rights within the child welfare, juvenile justice, and special education systems, highlighting concerns that pre-date COVID-19 as well as recent legal implications of the pandemic. Each section examines the particular repercussions of the pandemic and the response to it on children and proposes potential remedies. It also offers perspective on how meeting today’s critical challenges can result in long-term systemic improvements

Court Strategy

This session focuses on the following issues: (1) access to the courts, (2) secrecy of court documents and settlements, (3) court bias, and (4) public education and tools. The panelists present possible solutions for the issues discussed

Interventions to improve perinatal outcomes among migrant women in high-income countries: a systematic review protocol

INTRODUCTION: Women who are migrants and who are pregnant or postpartum are at high risk of poorer perinatal outcomes compared with host country populations due to experiencing numerous additional stressors including social exclusion and language barriers. High-income countries (HICs) host many migrants, including forced migrants who may face additional challenges in the peripartum period. Although HICs' maternity care systems are often well developed, they are not routinely tailored to the needs of migrant women. The primary objective will be to determine what interventions exist to improve perinatal outcomes for migrant women in HICs. The secondary objective will be to explore the effectiveness of these interventions by exploring the impact on perinatal outcomes. The main outcomes of interest will be rates of preterm birth, birth weight, and number of antenatal or postnatal appointments attended. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: This protocol follows the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) Protocols guidelines. EMBASE, EMCARE, MEDLINE and PsycINFO, CENTRAL, Scopus, CINAHL Plus, and Web of Science, as well as grey literature sources will be searched from inception up to December 2022. We will include randomised controlled trials, quasi-experimental and interventional studies of interventions, which aim to improve perinatal outcomes in any HIC. There will be no language restrictions. We will exclude studies presenting only qualitative outcomes and those including mixed populations of migrant and non-migrant women. Screening and data extraction will be completed by two independent reviewers and risk of bias will be assessed using the Quality Assessment Tool for Quantitative Studies. If a collection of suitably comparable outcomes is retrieved, we will perform meta-analysis applying a random effects model. Presentation of results will comply with guidelines in the Cochrane Handbook of Systematic Reviews of Interventions and the PRISMA statement. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval is not required. Results will be submitted for peer-reviewed publication and presented at national and international conferences. The findings will inform the work of the Lancet Migration European Hub. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: CRD42022380678