Children’s health

From cancer to infectious disease to mental health, the well-being of youth is taking centre stage.

ADHD linked to early births, risks of cannabis use while breastfeeding and other studies.

Society’s best defence against childhood diseases is waning. What needs to be done to help it recover?

Maartje Boer explains how using social media can be good for young people, and how to spot the warning signs of problematic use.

After 30 years of development, there is finally a vaccine for malaria. But it might take years to get it to the children who need it.

The immunotherapy is beginning to show promise in solid tumours, but researchers want more dedicated research in young people.

Widespread violence takes a serious toll on children’s mental health. But there are ways to alleviate the suffering.

A shortage of participants means that paediatric trials take longer and there is less financial incentive for pharmaceutical companies.

A panel of physicians and researchers discusses the reasons for the paucity of trials, the effect it has on patients and how the approval process for paediatric drugs could be streamlined.

Treating mothers for opioid addiction throughout pregnancy reduces complications during delivery and beyond.

This study uses data on social-distancing compliance from 19 year olds and their parents during two UK-wide lockdowns and finds evidence to suggest that mothers influence their child’s compliance with social-distancing guidelines.

A randomized trial in Botswana during COVID-19 provides evidence of effective distance education using ‘low-tech’ mobile phone approaches when school is disrupted. Weekly phone tutoring and SMS messages improved learning cost-effectively.

Here the authors report a single arm pilot trial to investigate combined spinal neuromodulation and activity-based neurorehabilitation therapy on voluntary sensory-motor function in children with cerebral palsy.

Common polygenic variation at chromosome 16p and rare recurrent deletions of 16p11.2 influencing autism risk are associated with reduced expression of genes throughout the 16p region, suggesting functional convergence of rare and common variant effects.

The El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) influences the weather around the world and, therefore, has strong impacts on society. Here, the authors show that ENSO is associated with child nutrition in many countries, with warmer El Niño conditions leading to more child undernutrition in large parts of the developing world.