Health & Nutrition

The goal of the research ‘Bulgaria grows with its children: Building professional competences for early childhood development’ (hereinafter referred to as ‘research on the early years workforce’ and ‘the research’) is to outline the main directions for improvement of the professionalization of the early years workforce on the basis of data – quantitative and qualitative – as well as to formulate recommendations for policy development in this area.



This summary shares the main results and recommendations derived from this research.

The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has upended families’ lives, with school closures, social distancing, and stay-at-home measures limiting their access to support systems, while adding to health concerns and economic uncertainties. As families face these varied stressors, it is even more important that parenting programs, which seek to promote positive and responsive caregiving, improve health and nutrition, and enhance social and child protection, continue to operate.

Early childhood development (ECD) services have a strong, positive impact on children’s development. Research from diverse contexts shows that interventions that promote nurturing care in early learning environments significantly improve childhood development and later adult outcomes.

Early childhood development (ECD) services have a strong, positive impact on children’s development. Research from diverse contexts shows that interventions that promote nurturing care in early learning environments significantly improve childhood development and later adult outcomes.

This Guide accompanies the Home Visiting Workforce Needs Assessment Tool, which aims to help Ministries and government agencies reflect on the ways in which they can support personnel delivering home visiting programs across sectors for pregnant mothers and caregivers with children under 3. 



The Home Visiting Workforce Needs Assessment Tool aims to help Ministries and government agencies reflect on the ways in which they can support personnel delivering home visiting programs across sectors for pregnant mothers and caregivers with children under 3. Drawing inspiration from the UNICEF Pre-Primary Diagnostic and Planning Tool, this tool is intended for countries with home visiting programs at either the sub-national or national levels.

It is anticipated that COVID-19 (the disease caused by the novel coronavirus named SAR-CoV-2) will occur in most, if not all countries.

Information on the impact of COVID-19 on early pregnancy outcomes remains unavailable at the time of writing. Non-pregnant women of childbearing age are also at low risk of severe disease. The impact on acute care services in settings with under-resourced health systems is likely to be substantial.

Health workers are at the front line of the COVID-19 outbreak response and as such are exposed to hazards that put them at risk of infection. Hazards include pathogen exposure, long working hours, psychological distress, fatigue, occupational burnout, stigma, and physical and psychological violence. This document highlights the rights and responsibilities of health workers, including the specific measures needed to protect occupational safety and health.

Informing and guiding the development of a Framework to Strengthen the Capacity of “Tipat Halav” nurses in Israel is a qualitative research study on behalf of Goshen Institute, with the overall objective to generate in-depth data that unveil effective processes and strategies which need to be in place in order to achieve a practice-change among