Section: Child and adolescent public health

Child and adolescent public health -> Aims of the section

Mission

To support public health efforts in Europe to help children and adolescents achieve best possible health

Aims

To connect and exchange knowledge with public health professionals interested in child and adolescent health
To provide analysis on child and adolescent health
To advocate for child and adolescent health in all policies
To translate science into action for child and adolescent health

Priority themes

These priorities were reached through a process of consultation and professional stakeholder consensus. We have consulted our members through a questionnaire survey, Join The Network Meetings, workshop discussions and evidence review EUPHA Council and Steering Committee before (¹) and after the COVID pandemic in 2020 (²). Member consultation is an embedded activity for child and adolescent health section to meet our aims through an action plan for 2021-2023 to deliver the objectives listed below. We aim at including children and adolescents into future discussion about public health priorities.

First 1000 days:

Preconception and pregnancy
Health literacy of parental skills, postnatal care
Access to urgent care and preventive care, vaccine uptake

Health in School aged children:

Embedding healthy behaviours; creating an environment that encourages healthy behaviours; nutrition, physical activity, screen exposure, sleep quality
Addressing health inequalities, poverty, marginalisation

Adolescent and young people’s health :

Impact of digital devices and social media- a concern before a reality now
Giving a voice to children and young people; meaningful engagement in health policy
Impact of covid 19 on opportunities to social and emotional quality of education and thereby opportunities

¹ Jansen D, Saxena S, Azzopardi-Muscat N. Public Health Practice and Policy to Improve Child and Adolescent Health in Europe. J Pediatr. 2017;190:293-4.e2.
² Jansen D, Kosola S, Arevalo LC, Gaspar de Matos M, Boode K, Saxena S, Dratva J. Child and adolescent health needs attention now, and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Int J Public Health. 2020.