Healthy environments for healthy children – UNICEF

Children Born Today Have Better Survival Chances, but Climate Change Threatens Progress

A child born today has a significantly higher chance of reaching their fifth birthday than ever before. However, climate change and environmental degradation threaten to reverse these advances in child and adolescent survival, health, and well-being.

Children globally face numerous environmental hazards, such as polluted air, water, and food; exposure to toxic chemicals; unsafe infrastructure; and climate change-related threats. Extreme weather events like floods and wildfires destroy infrastructure and economies, posing unique threats to young bodies and minds. Slower-onset events, such as droughts and the spread of parasites, bacterial, and viral diseases, present more pronounced dangers for children.

Addressing environmental risks could prevent an estimated 26% of deaths in children under five. Environmental hazards have been linked to various significant health risks for children. For example, the global rise in cancer, diabetes, neurodevelopmental disorders, and asthma has coincided with a surge in air pollution, e-waste, and harmful chemicals in everyday products. Currently, 300 million children live in areas with toxic air, where toxicity levels are six or more times higher than international guidelines. Additionally, around one in three children – up to 800 million worldwide – have dangerously high blood lead levels.

Improving children’s ability to survive and thrive requires addressing the profound ways environmental factors shape their health and well-being. UNICEF’s programs for survival, health, and well-being emphasize action on climate change and environmental degradation, responding to local disease burdens and risk factors.

The Healthy Environments for Healthy Children Global Programme Framework outlines five major actions to guide UNICEF country programs:

1. Mobilizing collective action.
2. Enhancing primary health care.
3. Improving resilience in health care facilities.
4. Integrating climate and environmental education into school programs.
5. Empowering children and young people to be agents of change.

UNICEF, in collaboration with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Bank, founded the Children’s Environmental Health Collaborative. The Collaborative aims to mobilize international action to protect child health and development from the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation. Every child has the right to a healthy environment, and everyone has a role to play.

Key Initiatives and Reports:

• Key findings from a groundbreaking report on lead exposure and its effects on children.
• Immediate action required to prevent a malnutrition crisis among children in Zambia – UNICEF.
• Air pollution accounted for 8.1 million deaths globally in 2021, becoming the second leading risk factor for death, including for children under five.
• Flash floods in Afghanistan posing urgent and persistent threats to children.
• Children’s Environmental Health Collaborative.
• Healthy Environments for Healthy Children Global Programme Framework.
• Healthy Environments for Healthy Children: Key messages.
• Healthy Environments for Healthy Children YouTube Playlist.
• Protecting children from heat stress: A technical note.
• The Toxic Truth: Children’s exposure to lead pollution undermines a generation of future potential.
• The climate crisis is a child rights crisis: Introducing the Children’s Climate Risk Index.
• Environment and Climate Change.

Source: Unicef