Citation, summary and extracts below.
CITATION: Ensuring the safety of newborns and children through community and healthcare actions (Viewpoint)
Moise Muzigaba,Ayda Taha ,Mike English,Junior Mudji,Desire Habonimana,Sophie Jullien,Nuhu Yaqub
Published: September 11, 2025
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1004730
SUMMARY
World Patient Safety Day 2025 is dedicated to “Safe Care for Every Newborn and Every Child”. In this Perspective, we highlight how parents, relatives, and the community, through observation and communication with healthcare workers, can become full partners in the safety of newborns and children, preventing harm at home, on the ward, and throughout the health system.
EXTRACTS
Preventable harm to newborns and children is probably far more widespread than is documented, especially in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)...
At the grassroots level, community engagement is critical for building safe and responsive primary healthcare systems...
Healthcare settings must do more to improve safety for newborns and children. In many LMICs, parents and family members are often the only people who continuously watch a sick newborn or child every minute, noticing changes in skin tone, a missed feed, or a drip that has stopped. Listening to them is therefore not a courtesy but a life‑saving safety measure...
Looking ahead, we propose a tiered approach... Safety action and feedback loop linking communities, parents, families, healthcare workers, managers, and policymakers to protect newborns and children.
Ensuring safe care for every newborn and child will require not only action from health systems and governments but also active participation from parents, families, and communities whose voices and vigilance must be recognized as essential to preventing harm and saving lives.
CHIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org