This study examined whether childhood out-of-home care was associated with all-cause mortality until the end of 2013 in the UK.

In this study, the authors interviewed social care practitioners including directors, senior and middle managers, frontline social workers, social worker‐academics and family support workers who work with vulnerable children to identify the issues and concerns held by social care workers about placing vulnerable children in boarding schools.

A joint report by charities Barnardo’s, the Children’s Society, Action for Children, the NSPCC and the National Children’s Bureau,  warns that the COVID-19 pandemic will exacerbate existing problems in underfunded local authorities and calls on the UK Government to invest money in children’s services to stop families reaching crisis point after coronavirus, says this article from ITV News.

The Derry-based charity, Kinship Care, "said many of its kinship carers - where a grandparent, other relative or close friend is given guardianship of a child under sometimes quite traumatic circumstances - had been left without food and other essential aid as a result of the pandemic," according to this article from the Irish News.

This guidance from the UK Department for Education outlines actions to be taken by educational providers - working together with other partners, where relevant, such as local authorities - to meet the needs of vulnerable children and young people during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In this online event, Family for Every Child members FSCE (Ethiopia), The Mulberry Bush (UK), Praajak (India) and CSID (Bangladesh) discussed children's care in the context of COVID-19.

"The [UK] government could face legal action after ministers used the coronavirus crisis to remove protections for children in care," says this article from the Huffington Post.

This article explores the important increase in awareness surrounding the care-crime connection (the over-representation of care-experienced individuals in criminal justice settings) in recent years.

"Concerns have been raised about how children in the Irish care system are coping during the coronavirus pandemic," says this article from the Irish Examiner.

This blog post from Strengthening Families For Abandoned Children (SFAC) features a decision map and accompanying guide to making decisions about where and how to place a child during a large-scale emergency, like the COVID-19 pandemic.