Child abuse and neglect is occurring all the time, even as it goes undetected by authorities entrusted with its prevention and mitigation. Sometimes, the very authorities mandated to protect children are perpetrators, making rescue interventions a complex process. Nurses, as part of the health care system and institutions of care, are constantly faced with ethical dilemmas as they prevent, rescue, manage, and rehabilitate children who are at risk of or have experienced abuse and/or neglect. Balancing ethical principles such as autonomy, beneficence and justice become very challenging.

In this webinar, Miriam C.A. Wagoro, a mental health nurse and research ethics specialist with the University of Nairobi in Kenya, will discuss how those who are mandated to protect children can balance the duty to care and ethical principles for children under our care.

For the first time, the international community is preparing to celebrate 9 September as the first International Day to Protect Education from Attack. The aim of the high-level event is to commemorate and promote this important international day and a call to stop attacks on education. This commemoration comes in the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic.

Education has been hit particularly hard by the COVID-19 pandemic with – according to UNESCO data – at its peak 1.6 billion learners forced out of school, representing about 90% of world learners in more than 190 countries. Children and youth in under-resourced communities and in conflict zones remain among the most vulnerable to the impact of COVID-19, as many have been left without distance learning infrastructure and connectivity. COVID-19 has highlighted the structural inequalities that exist in education, and the urgency to address them.

Join Her Highness Sheika Moza bint Nasser, Chairperson of Education Above All Foundation and UN Sustainable Development Goals Advocate,  António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General, H.E. Prof. Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, the President of the 74th Session of the General Assembly, and Dr Howard Taylor, the Executive Director of the End Violence Partnership, to commemorate this important day. 

Around the world, children and families are facing an unprecedented crisis as COVID-19 results in adverse impacts of increasing scale. Lockdown efforts raise the risk of violence, hunger, child labor, child marriage, and school dropouts among girls. This event will explore the pandemic through the eyes of children; raise awareness of the critical importance of learning from children’s experiences to strengthen child protection systems; and mobilize children and youth as a force for implementation of SDG 16.2.