GA at UN: Children and Youth

The meeting, From 2011 to 2019: Global NCD Progress for Children and Youth, focused on (1) sharing global programs for NCDs, (2) developing new opportunities at the global level particularly in the context of UHC, and (3) inspiring young people to speak out and in support of NCDs.

In order to ‘walk the talk’ they had two youth moderators, Dr. Marie Hauerslev and Dr. George Msengi.

In discussing the largest changes the NCDs community has observed, Sir George Alleyne explained (1) the shift to fundamentally listening to youth as opposed to the tokenism of inclusion previously and (2) the flow of information.

Dr. Stefan Peterson, the Associate Director of the Program Division and Chief of Health for UNICEF, discussed some of the current frustrations for adolescents and NCDs in the context of UHC including that collectively the community is still at the advocacy stage, partially due to the lack of mobilized resources. However, it is encouraging that UNICEF has moved towards programming and have developed new guidelines on community-based mental health and psychosocial support.

Her Royal Highness Princess Dina Mired focused on a transformative (and progressive) systems approach to achieve UHC, by finding efficiencies, communicating messages clearly and ensuring that ‘nothing for us without us’.

These concepts were supported by the panel and emphasized with action steps forward to (1) learn from shared experience, particularly through political entrepreneurs and champions and (2) link NCDs and UHC with human capital in messaging. #youthNCDs #youth4health #SDG3