Maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health

International Day of the Midwife 2020

5 May 2020: Amidst the raging COVID 19 pandemic, midwives continue to show resilience and provide life-saving services to pregnant women, ensuring healthy outcomes for women and their babies.

• The theme for 2020 is ‘Midwives with women: celebrate, demonstrate, mobilize, unite - our time is NOW!
• See the flyer
• Princess Anne video and opening of IDM global event

Launch of Strategic and Technical Advisory Group of Experts (STAGE) for Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and Nutrition: 30 April 2020

WHO’s new Strategic and Technical Advisory Group of Experts (STAGE) for Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and Nutrition (MNCAH&N;) met virtually 30 April-1 May 2020. The core function of the STAGE is to provide strategic and technical advice to WHO as it revitalizes Primary Health Care as part of its Universal Health Coverage strategy. Particularly now that some of our common goal of improving the health and well-being of women, children and adolescents are at risk due to the impact of COVID-19, the STAGE can help countries to accelerate progress towards them. STAGE comprises 31 members, serving in their personal capacities and representing a broad range of disciplines relevant to MNCAH&N.;

• More details on the membership and Terms of Reference are available at STAGE Home Page

Effective coverage measurement in maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and nutrition

Visit to read more about effective coverage future directions

Go to to see currently available global data on coverage of key interventions for pregnancy, delivery, child and adolescent health

COVID-19 : Resources and support for MNCAH and Ageing

A compilation of resources such as guidance documents, and Q&As; which provide helpful information on various topic in maternal, newborn, child, adolescent health and ageing in the context of COVID-19

• Link to resources

Maternal immunization and antenatal care service delivery situation analysis: report of the MIACSA project, 2016–2019

Vaccine-preventable diseases are among the main causes of global child morbidity and mortality, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Maternal vaccines given to pregnant women in the second or third trimester have emerged as a promising way to address vaccine-preventable diseases, providing protection to the newborn during the most vulnerable period in life, through the trans-placental transfer of maternal antibodies. A multi-method study, the Maternal Immunization and Antenatal Care Situation Analysis (MIACSA), was conducted between November 2016 and June 2019 (32 months) aiming to explore current and future preparedness to introduce and implement new maternal vaccines.

• Read the report

Improving early childhood development: WHO guideline

Enabling young children to achieve their full developmental potential is a human right and an essential requisite for sustainable development. Given the critical importance of enabling children to make the best start in life, the health sector, among other sectors, has an important role and responsibility to support nurturing care for early childhood development.This guideline provides direction for strengthening policies and programmes to better address early childhood development.

• Link to the guideline

A future for the world’s children?

February 19th will see the launch of a major new report on child health and well-being by an independent WHO-UNICEF-Lancet Commission. Entitled A future for the world’s children?, this is the first comprehensive, independent report to reposition every aspect of child health through the lens of our rapidly changing climate and other existential threats. It is the result of more than two years of work by 40 child health experts from around the world, led by Her Excellencies Helen Clark, former Prime Minister of New Zealand, and Awa Coll-Seck, Minister of State of Senegal. It details critical, emerging risks to child health; proposes novel solutions; and calls for urgent action to achieve measurable results.

• Link to the virtual launch and live stream

Call for STAGE members

WHO is soliciting proposals globally for nominations of experts to serve on its Strategic and Technical Advisory Group of Experts (STAGE) on Maternal, Newborn, Child, Adolescent Health, and Nutrition (MNCAH&N;). Nominations of female candidates and candidates from low-and middle-income countries are specifically encouraged. Applications will be reviewed by a selection panel, which will propose nominees to the WHO Director-General for appointment.

• Link to STAGE page

More women and children survive today than ever before – UN report

19 September 2019 -- More women and their children are surviving today than ever before, according to new child and maternal mortality estimates released today by United Nations groups led by WHO and UNICEF. Still, the new estimates reveal that 6.2 million children under 15 years died in 2018, and over 290 000 women died due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth in 2017. Of the total child deaths, 5.3 million occurred in the first 5 years, with almost half of these in the first month of life. Women and newborns are most vulnerable during and immediately after childbirth. An estimated 2.8 million pregnant women and newborns die every year, or 1 every 11 seconds, mostly of preventable causes.

• View the report and data on child mortality estimates
• View the report and data on maternal mortality estimates
• Read the news release

Management of the sick young infant aged up to 2 months - updated chart booklet and training manuals

August 2019 -- This update reflects the recent guidelines on Managing possible serious bacterial infection (PSBI) in young infants when referral is not feasible published in 2015. It includes assessment, classification and referral of sick young infants (SYI) with PSBI; and outpatient treatment of SYI with local infection or fast breathing (pneumonia) in infants 7-59 days old. Other updates include: a new section on how to reassess, classify and treat SYI with PSBI when referral is not feasible in outpatient health facilities by IMNCI trained health workers; changes in assessment and management of young infants for HIV infection; and identification of infants less than 7 days of who need Kangaroo Care. The IMCI training course for health workers has been updated to reflect these updates to support the capacity building of health workers in using the updated SYI IMNCI chart booklet.

• Read the Chart Booklet and Training Manuals

New resource consolidates data for maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health

The MNCAH Data Portal is a new unique resource that brings together many different data on key indicators from several sources into one central place. The Data Portal will be the first comprehensive compilation of data on demographics, mortality, morbidity, risk factors, coverage and policy on maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health. It will help identify and fill gaps, as well as fulfilling global and national monitoring needs. Current key features include access to the data for each indicator, visualization of indicators; country profiles and other static visualizations and information on the advisory groups on measurement of maternal and newborn (MoNITOR), child (CHAT), and adolescent health (GAMA) and quality of care of maternal and newborn health metrics.

• Go to the Data Portal