Season 3, episode 1
2021: Hope, COVID-19 vaccines and UNICEF
As we begin a new year with new hope and optimism, listen in on children asking us tough questions about UNICEF’s role in COVID-19 vaccine distribution. In this episode we also learn about the impact of pandemic related interruptions on children’s education and how vaccination will play a role in ensuring that learning can resume.
Producers: Priyadarshini Mitra, Victoria Ptashnick
Sound Mix: Chandra Bulucon
Episode Transcript:
[00:00:00.99] [MUSIC PLAYING]
[00:00:15.37] Did you hear that? One of the most beautiful sounds in the world-- children's laughter. I wanted to begin this year and our new season with this sound because it's what gives purpose and meaning to everything we do. We at UNICEF are fortunate because with your support, we bring smiles and that laughter you just heard in some of the world's toughest places during the toughest of times.
[00:00:44.80] As we enter the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, we begin the year with new hope and optimism, hope that we can impact change to weaken the virus's firm grasp on the world and optimism that your support will give us the power to do so. I'm David Morley, president and CEO of UNICEF Canada and your host of the For Every Child podcast.
[00:01:12.84] [MUSIC PLAYING]
[00:01:35.77] It's a year into the pandemic, and we're still seeing COVID-19 case numbers rise, and the most vulnerable have been the worst affected. The world's hope for respite rests on a vaccine. Rollouts of these vaccines have begun in many countries around the world, including here at home in Canada. But if there's one thing that we learned during this pandemic, it is that no one is safe unless everyone is safe. The only way this pandemic can end is if vaccines reach every person in every country around the world.
[00:02:15.41] But here's something that makes me excited and inspired about our work in 2021. UNICEF is leading global efforts in the world's largest and fastest ever procurement and supply of vaccines. We're working to ensure all countries that are part of the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access Facility-- it's also known as COVAX-- that all those countries will have equitable access to 2 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines by the end of 2021.
[00:02:47.94] These include 92 low and lower-middle income countries and over 97% upper-, middle-, and high-income nations too. Together, they represent more than 4/5 of the world's population. Now, what does that truly mean? To explain this, I have to briefly relinquish my role of host and be at the receiving end of questions from some individuals who ask some of the world's toughest questions-- children.
[00:03:19.02] Hi, David.
[00:03:20.28] Hi, David.
[00:03:22.12] Hi, David.
[00:03:22.99] Hi, David.
[00:03:24.85] Hi, David.
[00:03:26.32] Hi, Mr. David.
[00:03:28.42] Hi, David. My name's Noah, and today, I'll be asking you some questions.
[00:03:32.83] Hi.
[00:03:34.24] My name is Alice. I like pasta.
[00:03:39.58] Thanks, Alice. My favorite kind of pasta is macaroni and cheese, actually.
[00:03:44.29] What is COVAX?
[00:03:46.03] You know, COVAX is bringing together the smartest people in the world to get COVID vaccines out to everyone who needs it. And that's everyone in the world.
[00:03:59.15] Hi. I'm [INAUDIBLE]. What does UNICEF have to do with it?
[00:04:04.18] At UNICEF, we get vaccines out to children all over the world. So when people have to get vaccines, they ask us for help because we know how to do it.
[00:04:16.27] How come we need it?
[00:04:18.16] [INAUDIBLE], we need COVAX because we need everyone in the world working together to stop COVID-19. It's not enough just for one city or one province to do it, not even for one country. It's got to be everybody, everybody in the whole world, like on the map in my kitchen. That's the way we'll beat this pandemic.
[00:04:42.13] Hi. I'm Liam. I like playing with dinosaurs.
[00:04:46.15] I like dinosaurs too, Liam.
[00:04:48.88] Why was UNICEF asked to help?
[00:04:51.97] The people who made COVAX asked us for our help because we know how to get vaccines to people all over the world. We know how to keep them really, really cold, because a lot of these vaccines have to be kept cold. And then we know how to get them out to villages, maybe places where there are no roads. We'll put them on boats, on motorboats, and the motorboats will take them to the villages, or they'll get on planes, and the planes will fly them to their villages. We know how to do that. And that's why UNICEF has to be part of COVAX.
[00:05:28.27] My name is [INAUDIBLE], and I'm eight years old. Why should kids care about COVAX?
[00:05:34.33] Well, for a starter, it means that you'll be able to play with your friends the way you used to. It means you'll be able to hug your grandparents the way you used to. It means you'll be able to be back in school. And then for kids, kids who are in poorer parts of the world, it means that they'll be able to get back to having a better chance in life too. So for kids everywhere, stopping the pandemic will mean a better future for everybody.
[00:06:08.06] Thanks for those great questions.
[00:06:10.90] Bye, David.
[00:06:12.73] Bye, David.
[00:06:14.53] Bye, Mr. David.
[00:06:16.45] Bye.
[00:06:18.04] Curious and eager to learn new things. Children's energy and curiosity are gifts that help them shape a world better than the one they were born into. The education that they receive in schools sharpens their minds and hones these skills. Teachers are critical to this learning. Through the pandemic, teachers and education workers have gone above and beyond to try and ensure education doesn't stop. Teachers like Irene in Uganda came up with new and inventive ways to continue learning for her students.
[00:07:00.59] When the government decided to close the schools, that came as a complete surprise. So it's new terrain for the teachers, for the parents, for the children. There's different types of children, different social backgrounds, because a school community can be very, very diverse. For many of our children, they have never really had to type. A majority of parents didn't have access to laptops. What they seem to have were their mobile phones. So we thought, OK, let's work with WhatsApp.
[00:07:47.09] The students that don't have access to WhatsApp have an option to pick hard copies of the assignments. Robert is one of the parents in the school. He doesn't live very close to the school, so travels quite some distance to come here. But he still supports his children at home because they are competing just as well as all the other children.
[00:08:14.69] I think the challenge for most parents was they are not equipped to teach. They're struggling with keeping them engaged. They're easily distracted. And many of them have TVs. And we thought that maybe if they see their teachers on television, engaging them, they will be excited to watch and learn something.
[00:08:40.70] So at Clark Junior School, we also launched a TV show called Crested Kids. I think COVID-19, this period of learning and trying out all these different methods to keep the learning going, has definitely allowed us to grow as individuals, as teachers. But also, the children are learning to own it, because that's really what we're aiming for when we try to get the children to inquire and discover on their own. This remote learning has provided a beautiful opportunity for that.
[00:09:25.61] Despite the best efforts of teachers like Irene, at the peak of the pandemic, 90% of the world's children had their learning interrupted due to school closures. More than a third of those school children had no access to remote education. 1.5 billion children missed out on their right to education. Many of them may drop out and never return to school. The situation should definitely make each one of us worry.
[00:09:55.82] To speak to us about this, we're joined by UNICEF Canada's director of international policy and programs, Annie Bodmer-Roy. Hi, Annie.
[00:10:05.87] Hi, David. Thank you for having me.
[00:10:07.76] Well, first of all, I want to ask you, Annie-- you've got two young children of your own. Being a parent during this pandemic has been so challenging. How has it affected you and your kids?
[00:10:21.03] Well, thanks for asking. Certainly as a parent, it's been a challenging time. My kids are both young. And when the pandemic started, my youngest, my son Matteo, was still in daycare. The first wave of the pandemic that we saw here in Canada had both daycares and schools closed in Ontario where I live. So the first wave, it was really a challenge in keeping them engaged in the day to day, making sure that there was a routine, a reason to get up every morning for them and get dressed and have breakfast and really just keep them from fighting during the day but also keeping them engaged in different types of learning activities and getting outside and getting some exercise, all while also, obviously, working full time.
[00:11:09.21] I'm actually really fortunate that my husband is a stay-at-home dad. And so he was able to take the brunt of responsibility to ensure that the kids got outside every day, and at least they weren't stuck to their screens too much. At the same time I say that it's been hard, I'm also very aware of how hard it's been for parents and children across the country, knowing that I'm one of the lucky ones.
[00:11:35.31] In Canada, I've been thinking a lot about single moms in particular, about families living in settings where they don't have regular access to outdoors, where parents have had to go to continue to provide essential services and have had to scramble to provide care for their children that supports their children's learning and development and their safety and well-being. For example, I come from a family where my sister is a doctor, and my other sister is a teacher. And so I've just been very aware of the challenges that they've been facing as well as parents.
[00:12:10.89] You're right, Annie, that these school closures have had such devastating consequences. And it's especially on-- as you said, it's on those children who are the farthest from opportunity, both here in Canada and around the world. Their education is at risk. But it's not just their learning that's being impacted. Isn't that right, Annie?
[00:12:33.61] That's exactly right. What we see in Canada and around the world is that when there are different crises that hit-- for example, in different countries where we work, there are conflicts. There are climate shocks and other disasters. There have actually been pandemics in the past as well. And we often see that schools are among the first to close and, actually, often can be among the last to open.
[00:12:58.33] In a lot of cases, schools are used as shelters for families who have been displaced. And in the context, for example, of Ebola, and now again with COVID, schools were closed as a measure to stop the spread and to save lives. And you're right that it does have an impact on children's learning. And I do really want to pause on that, because children's learning has actually been completely disrupted in this pandemic.
[00:13:23.48] That means it's their ability to read, to do basic math, to write. My own daughter has really been struggling with that. And I have to say the teachers here in Canada have been fantastic and really deserve a shout out for the way that they have had to innovate and pivot with very tight timelines to provide really foundational learning, particularly for young children.
[00:13:44.74] And what we've seen all over the world is that these children at the younger age in particular, these foundational learning pieces like literacy and numeracy have really been affected. And for older children or those who already have a strong foundation in literacy numeracy, their learning has suffered in other ways, so for example, their ability to gain and to maintain the skills that they need to participate in the 21st-century economy. But it also goes far beyond learning.
[00:14:13.76] So there are many children in the world, for example, who rely on school meals as their primary source of nutrition in a day. And in some cases, that may be the children's only complete meal in a whole day. When schools close, school feeding programs like the ones UNICEF supports in countries around the world also close. And without these school meals, children are left hungry. This has an impact not only on their immediate well-being, but their longer term nutrition. And that impacts their growth and development and actually, in some cases, could threaten their survival.
[00:14:48.47] So it's important to note, too, that we're not just talking about a handful of children here. What we saw as UNICEF-- that the closure of schools last year actually led to 369 million children who have missed out on school meals. So that's another major impact of school closures on children. There's another one I want to mention, which is children's protection. So schools are often safe places for children at a time when the world around them isn't always safe. And again, thinking about children here in conflict settings or who have been displaced from their homes or in natural disasters or even living in a dangerous situation at home. We see this in a lot of different countries.
[00:15:30.97] And with schools closed with lockdown measures in place throughout many developing countries, there's a real fear of an increase in violence against children, and particularly to gender-based violence and violence against women and girls. So for example, some estimates suggest that the combination of school closures and lockdown measures could result in about 13 million additional child marriages.
[00:15:55.66] So in the face of all of this, what are some of the strategies that we need to implement so that we can be sure that children can safely access education during this pandemic?
[00:16:11.15] So that that's actually really-- it's a tough one. And as UNICEF globally, we've really been trying to raise the bar and meet the challenge there to ensure that the pandemic doesn't mean that children have to stop learning. And there, I think it's important to note that learning can, in fact, continue even when schools are closed. It's not easy, and we've had to really find new and innovative ways to do that.
[00:16:37.70] One example I'm really proud of is a project we're implementing with support from the government of Canada. It's called Back to School Better, and it also is supported by Canadians themselves to ensure that refugees and displaced girls in Burkina Faso, Mali, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, or DRC, can continue or can resume their learning even when they can't access physical schools. So the project supports teachers and education workers to provide distance learning through things like online teaching or teaching through radio and other broadcast programs, and it also supports at the community level to make sure that children and their families are equipped to access learning. So for example, we've been providing solar-powered radios and conducting different activities to ensure that girls in particular can advocate for their rights and ensure that they know they do have the right to education.
[00:17:34.57] And the reason the project works specifically with refugee and displaced girls is really because of level of need. And that's one thing I did really want to highlight, is that when we're talking about access to education during the pandemic, there are groups of children who actually weren't even in schools, many of them, even before the pandemic. And this project really focuses in on refugee and displaced girls because those are the groups that really, in a lot of cases, were furthest behind, even before COVID.
[00:18:03.04] So for example, more than half of the world's school-aged refugee children, so over a 3.5 million girls and boys, were out of school before the pandemic began. So there's a lot of catch-up that groups of children who have been displaced need to do. And similarly with education, girls' education has really been put further behind. We've really seen a lot of progress in the past decades that have allowed many more girls to access education and really close the gender gap in education. And now with the pandemic, there's really a risk there that close to 80 million girls who have returned to the classroom over the past decades might be missing out even more again.
[00:18:49.70] And then what about here at home too? What's UNICEF Canada doing to make sure that we'll do our part to help be sure that our kids will be going back to school here in Canada too?
[00:19:05.23] What's really clear for us at UNICEF is that getting children back in school must be a national and a global priority. And we really have to support teachers and ensure their protection so that they can really be considered amongst the frontline workers and essential workers who are putting themselves at risk, really making sure that they can provide children's education.
[00:19:29.42] So we've actually just launched a very exciting campaign to ensure that teachers can be safe and protected and continue to provide the education that children need and that children have a right to. So here in Canada, and, in fact, around the world, UNICEF is calling for governments to prioritize teachers and education workers to receive the COVID-19 vaccine after frontline health workers and other high-risk populations. What we really need to do is protect our teachers from community transmission and keep them healthy so that they themselves can stay safe, and they can continue to play the critical role of teaching children here in Canada and around the world.
[00:20:10.52] And that will be an important part, I guess, to make sure that things can return to normal as soon as possible, that we can start to make up those education losses so that people like your kids will be able to go back to school and go back to their learning as soon as possible. Thank you very much for joining us, Annie. It's always great to talk with you.
[00:20:35.24] Thanks for having me.
[00:20:37.64] If children are faced with another year of school closures, the effects will be felt for generations to come. Getting them back in school must be a national and a global priority. I strongly encourage every one of you to please go to UNICEF.ca to find out more about this campaign and to participate. Your voice could play a key role in making sure every child continues to learn.
[00:21:08.60] And with that, we come to the end of our first episode for the new year. Stay well, and stay safe. Thank you for listening.
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