Latest news with #children
BBC News
20 minutes ago
- General
- BBC News
Jersey nursery to close for day due to staffing shortages
Seventy families will be affected when a Jersey nursery closes for one day on Friday due to staff Leeward nursery said it had been trying for several months to find and maintain staff at Busy Bees but there were still not enough qualified staff to care for the said it had been proactive in promoting careers in early years education but there was a national shortage of nursery said closing was "a last resort". "The safety and wellbeing of the children in our care is our highest priority and it is because we cannot guarantee the required staffing levels we have made this decision," it said."We appreciate the impact this will have upon our families, especially coming at such short notice and we have apologised to them for the inconvenience this may cause and thank them for their patience and understanding." Jersey Leeward said it had worked with its sister nurseries to get the extra staff but was "unable to find adequate cover"."We will continue our efforts to recruit and work with our other nurseries to ensure that we have the staff we need to keep the nursery as a whole and individual rooms within it open," it said."It is a legal requirement that we meet all the statutory staff to child ratios and have suitably qualified supervision in nursery to operate, and tomorrow we are unable to do that."
News24
3 hours ago
- General
- News24
Limpopo woman Dineo Twala turns parents' home into disabled children's centre
A Limpopo woman has transformed her parents' house into a centre for children born with disabilities. Deep compassion and love for children motivated her to make a difference in their lives. Thirty-year-old Dineo Thwala, from the rural village of Bothashoek, provides comfort to children who are permanently disabled and paralysed. Her journey began with the challenge of caring for her sister's child, who was born with cerebral palsy and couldn't walk, talk, or sit. This experience led her to establish the Tshepo Foundation, 'Tshepo' being a Sepedi name meaning 'Hope.' In 2019, Dineo's love for children blossomed into a fully-fledged centre. She started with a support group for parents of children born with disabilities. 'I encourage and teach other parents to train and exercise their children. I help them learn how to care for their children living with disabilities, using an app that outlines step-by-step methods to improve a disabled child's living conditions,' she explains. Eight-year-old Dimakatso Nkadimeng is one of the children who received a special mobility device called a Madiba Buggy during the 67 minutes of Mandela Day celebration. The device helps restore mobility and dignity for children who can't sit properly, providing essential body and head support. Unemployed young mothers Dikeledi Nkadimeng, 21, and Virginia Matlakala, 25, from Ga-Manoke village near Burgersfort, survive on their children's disability social grants. They stay at home and have struggled to find employment. Matlakala told Drum magazine that seeing her child play with other children and finally attempt to speak has brought her joy after countless years of trying to get a wheelchair for her child. 'My child used to watch with envy as other children played together,' Matlakala said. Dineo shared a success story: 'When Matlakala's daughter, Comfort, was first brought to the Tshepo Foundation, she was unable to do anything. Now she can speak, move around, and eat solid food without being selective about what she eats.' Caring for people living with disabilities has always been challenging, but for unemployed Thwala, it has become a passion that has developed into a centre for those born with disabilities. The centre operates from a house in her parents' backyard and cares for children with cerebral palsy, hydrocephalus, osteogenesis imperfecta, and other disabilities. 'We face challenges such as lack of cleaning materials, transport, toiletries, and wheelchairs,' Dineo explains. She continues to approach potential donors and funders, and her efforts are beginning to bear fruit. She also plans to secure land where she can build a proper centre for children living with disabilities. Read more | Limpopo man appeals for help to remove life-altering keloid growth Many children depend on her centre for social contact with other kids living with similar conditions. Thwala's advice to parents with disabled children is important: 'They often find themselves isolated at home because they literally have no one to communicate with. Here, they have a sense of belonging because we show them love and care.' Most of these children come from disadvantaged families, and the centre provides them with two meals a day. Thwala pleads for support from multidisciplinary professionals, including physiotherapists and occupational therapists, to volunteer their therapeutic expertise. This training would help improve the lives of those living with disabilities.
Medscape
3 hours ago
- Health
- Medscape
Chronic Conditions Raise Risk for RSV Hospitalizations
TOPLINE: Children with chronic medical conditions (CMCs) had higher rates of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)-related hospitalization than healthy children during their first two RSV seasons, with a sustained elevated risk in the second year. METHODOLOGY: Researchers conducted a retrospective population-based cohort study to identify children with CMCs who were at a higher risk for RSV-related hospitalizations during their first and second RSV seasons. They enrolled 431,937 children (51.4% boys) born in British Columbia, Canada, between April 2013 and March 2023, with or without a CMC, identified through the provincial health registry. The children were followed up until the day before their third RSV season or April 1, 2024, whichever came early. They compared RSV-related hospitalizations between 25,452 children diagnosed with at least one of 1116 distinct CMCs within their first 2 years of life and those without CMCs. The primary outcome was hospitalization due to RSV-related lower respiratory tract infection. Secondary outcomes included pediatric ICU admissions, hospital length of stay, and use of invasive mechanical ventilation. TAKEAWAY: In the first RSV season, the hospitalization rate per 1000 person-years was 15.9 (95% CI, 14.2-17.6) for children with CMCs and 8.0 (95% CI, 7.7-8.3) for those without CMCs. In the second season, the rate was 7.8 (95% CI, 6.7-8.8) for those with CMCs and 2.2 (95% CI, 2.1-2.3) without CMCs. Children with CMCs had longer hospital and pediatric ICU stays and required mechanical ventilation more frequently during their first two RSV seasons than healthy children. RSV-related hospitalization rates in the second season among children with CMCs involving the respiratory, cardiovascular, or gastrointestinal systems were twofold higher than the overall hospitalization rate in the first season. Moreover, children with Down syndrome or those born at less than 28 weeks of gestation had fivefold higher RSV-related hospitalization rates in the second season than all children in the first season. IN PRACTICE: 'Understanding the regional burden of RSV disease is critical to inform local RSV immunization guidelines. In regions with high IRs [incidence rates], a universal RSV prophylaxis program may be warranted. However, in jurisdictions with a lower burden of disease, targeted programs for children at high risk in their second RSV season may be more cost-effective,' the authors wrote. SOURCE: The study was led by Marina Viñeta Paramo, MBBS, Department of Pediatrics, University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was published online on July 8, 2025, in JAMA Network Open. LIMITATIONS: The use of retrospective health administrative data may have introduced biases due to coding variability and misclassification of RSV cases. The analysis did not account for the timing of CMC diagnoses or treatments received. The frequent co-occurrence of extreme prematurity in children with CMCs limited the ability to separate their independent effects. Additionally, the database excluded children not registered for provincial health insurance at birth, potentially omitting vulnerable populations. DISCLOSURES: This study was supported by financial aid to three authors, including funding from the British Columbia Children's Hospital Foundation. Two authors received financial support or a scholar award from Michael Smith Health Research BC. One author received grants from Merck, GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi Pasteur, Moderna, and Pfizer. This article was created using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication.
Arab News
4 hours ago
- Arab News
Protecting Sudan's children from war and starvation
In the midst of Sudan's relentless civil war, children have increasingly become the primary victims of a brutal and indiscriminate violence that shows no sign of abating. In a single weekend of attacks this month, at least 24 boys and 11 girls were reportedly killed in communities around the city of Bara — a tragic toll that drew urgent condemnation from UNICEF and reignited global concern over the war's deepening atrocities. These children were not caught in the crossfire by accident — they were targeted in areas of dense civilian population, further proving that the violence has abandoned all pretense of protecting the innocent. This devastating incident stands as a grim symbol of the horrors that have engulfed millions of children across the nation. From killings to starvation, from rape to disease, Sudan's children are enduring one of the most heartbreaking humanitarian catastrophes of the modern era. The world cannot look away. The war in Sudan, which erupted in April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces, has spiraled into one of the world's most catastrophic and underreported crises. What began as a power struggle between two rival military factions has degenerated into a total collapse of law, order and human dignity. Now in its third year, the conflict has displaced millions, decimated infrastructure and created a humanitarian vacuum that is being filled with starvation, disease and death. Nowhere is this more tragically evident than in the suffering of Sudan's children. According to UNICEF, the number of children in need of humanitarian assistance has doubled since the war began — from 7.8 million to an estimated 15 million. These are not just numbers. They represent children who have been torn from their homes, orphaned by shelling, starved by blockades, denied medicine and robbed of education. These are lives suspended in trauma, childhoods stolen in real time, futures endangered before they ever had a chance to begin. Sudan's children are enduring one of the most heartbreaking humanitarian catastrophes of the modern era Dr. Majid Rafizadeh The violence against children is not limited to bullets and bombs. It is structural, systemic and widespread. Malnutrition rates among children have soared, with thousands already perishing from hunger and disease due to the inability of aid agencies to reach them. International relief workers warn that, without immediate humanitarian access, tens of thousands more children in these regions are at imminent risk of dying preventable deaths. Compounding the horror is a health crisis spiraling out of control. Disease outbreaks have flourished in the absence of functioning clinics and vaccination programs. Only 48 percent of Sudanese children now receive basic immunizations — down from over 90 percent before the war. Diseases like measles, cholera, malaria and dengue are spreading rapidly, particularly in makeshift camps and besieged cities where clean water and medicine are nonexistent. The healthcare system, already fragile before the conflict, has collapsed under the weight of violence, looting and blockades. UNICEF warns that 770,000 children will suffer from severe acute malnutrition this year alone, with more than a million more teetering on the edge. In some areas, the malnutrition levels have reached levels consistent with famine. Children are not simply dying from bullets — they are dying silently from hunger, from diarrhea, from infections that a $2 vaccine could have prevented. And while their bodies wither, so do their minds and spirits. The psychological impact of this war on children is immeasurable. Many have witnessed their parents killed, their homes burned, their villages razed. Rape and sexual violence are used as weapons of war, with horrifying reports emerging of babies and toddlers being assaulted. These crimes are committed with impunity, often in front of families, often in communities too broken or terrified to respond. The psychological trauma of such experiences will not end with the war — it will ripple into the next generation, planting seeds of pain, rage and loss that may take decades to heal. There is also an educational catastrophe unfolding in parallel. More than 17 million children in Sudan are now out of school. That means an entire generation — already traumatized by war, hunger and displacement — is also being denied the single most powerful tool for recovery: education. Countless schools have been destroyed, looted or repurposed as shelters and military bases. Teachers have fled. Textbooks are gone. In many conflict zones, attending class is no longer possible — or safe. What does the future look like for a nation in which millions of children are growing up illiterate, uneducated and deeply scarred by war? It looks like perpetual conflict. It looks like generational poverty. It looks like the complete unraveling of a nation's social fabric. No child should ever be subjected to such horrors. No child should have to grow up surrounded by corpses, starvation, gunfire and fear. Childhood is supposed to be a time of play, learning, curiosity and growth — not of trauma, terror and survival. The longer this crisis continues, the more children will be permanently damaged — physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. And the more likely it becomes that these children, once grown, will either replicate the violence they have seen or be unable to rebuild what was lost. The cost of inaction is not just moral. It is generational. It is global. Childhood is supposed to be a time of play, learning, curiosity and growth — not of trauma, terror and survival Dr. Majid Rafizadeh The violence against children must end now. The international community must mobilize with urgency and resolve. First, pressure must be brought to bear on the warring parties to end their hostilities, particularly in civilian-populated zones. Targeted sanctions, diplomatic isolation and coordinated international pressure must be used to demand ceasefires — especially in areas where children are most at risk. All sides must be held accountable for violations of international law, particularly crimes committed against children. There can be no lasting peace without justice. There can be no stability if perpetrators are allowed to act with impunity. Simultaneously, humanitarian access must be secured without delay. Aid organizations must be allowed to reach besieged areas, deliver food, administer vaccinations and establish emergency health and nutrition centers. Governments, international donors and philanthropists must step up. UNICEF estimates that it needs more than $1 billion to meet the humanitarian needs of Sudanese children in 2025 alone. That figure is likely to rise. The global response has thus far been grossly underfunded and logistically strangled. This must change. A coordinated international effort must be launched to fund, staff and protect humanitarian missions in Sudan — starting now. We must also act to evacuate the most vulnerable children from active war zones. Safe corridors must be negotiated to extract children trapped in cities like Al-Fashir, Nyala and Khartoum. Displaced children must be resettled in secure environments with access to clean water, shelter, healthcare and education. Psychological counseling must be provided to help these children process their trauma. Remote learning programs and temporary schools should be rapidly expanded. Teachers must be trained, supplied and paid. Local nongovernmental organizations and civil society groups should be empowered with funding and logistical support to reach communities the UN cannot. This must be a full-spectrum response — one that addresses immediate survival needs and long-term recovery. Finally, the world must not turn its back on Sudan's children. It is easy to become numb to statistics. It is easy to be distracted by other crises. But we must resist the temptation to forget. The suffering of children in Sudan is a moral stain on our generation. If we claim to stand for human rights, we must act like it. If we value peace, we must work for it. If we believe in a future for all people, we must protect those who will inherit it. The children of Sudan are not just victims — they are the future of a nation that, if given a chance, could still rise from the ashes of war. In conclusion, the children of Sudan are enduring unspeakable horrors. They are being killed, starved, raped, traumatized and forgotten. This must not be allowed to continue. The war must end. The aid must flow. The world must act. Sudan's children must be protected — not tomorrow, not in a diplomatic meeting in a year's time, but now. Before another child dies. Before another girl is raped. Before another future is erased. The world must remember Sudan's children — and fight for them as if they were our own. Because in truth, they are.
South China Morning Post
8 hours ago
- General
- South China Morning Post
Gaza facing man-made ‘mass starvation' as hunger deaths surge, WHO says
Palestinian children wait to receive food at a charity kitchen in the Mawasi area of Khan Younis,... Palestinian children wait to receive food at a charity kitchen in the Mawasi area of Khan Younis, in the southern... share
