Justice and Human Rights South Africa Project #66878

Transforming Childrens's Palliative Care Globally

by International Children's Palliative Care Network

Project Report | Jul 6, 2026
Closing the Gap - July 2026 Report

By Julia Downing | Project Leader

Launch of #ClosetheGap

Thank you for your continued interest in children’s palliative care. We were very excited to launch our “Close the Gap: Palliative Care for Children Everywhere” Campaign on the 18^th June. Children’s palliative care is an essential part of universal health coverage and primary health care. It can and should be integrated into health systems in every country, regardless of income level or setting. Governments, global health agencies, donors, and partners share an ethical and legal responsibility to ensure that every child who needs palliative care can access it. Yet millions of children around the world continue to experience preventable pain and suffering because they lack access to palliative care and essential health services. Through the #ClosetheGap Campaign a global coalition of organisations, led by the International Children’s Palliative Care Network (ICPCN), is calling for urgent, coordinated action to ensure equitable access to children’s palliative care for all children, everywhere, without discrimination.

“Access to health care, including palliative care, is a basic human right and should be available to every child who needs it, no matter where they live or what condition they have. It should not depend on geography, so let’s work together to close the gap.”

Four Policy briefs have been developed as part of the campaign:

· Children’s Palliative Care: An Urgent Global Health Priority

· Children’s Palliative Care in Fragile, Conflict-affected and Vulnerable Settings: An Essential Intervention

· Pain Management as a Core Pillar of Children’s Palliative Care: A Global Health and Equity Imperative

· Lay Summary: Why Children’s Palliative Care Matters

You can download the policy briefs on our campaign page, as well as endorse the campaign, access our campaign toolkit and get involved. Please join us as we work together to close the gap for children’s palliative care.

We have also been busy at the World Health Assembly co-sponsoring a side event on Pain organised by the International Association for the Study of Pain. The side event called for a global pain coalition, and focused on pain and palliative care, pain in leprosy and pain in conflict settings. The side event was well attended and we were able to share our policy brief on pain management. We also had the opportunity to speak at a side event for the Commission for Narcotic Drugs and are working hard to expand access to pain medications for palliative care.

We continue to build capacity across the world for children’s palliative care and have been supporting a virtual training programme for nurses, for those working in humanitarian settings as well conducting face-to-face training in Ghana and Nigeria. We have also been working on the integration of the children’s palliative outcome scale in routine clinical practice in Ghana and Nigeria, and we hope to have access to an App to support this work, soon.

Thank you again for your continued support.

WHA Side event

Side event sponsors

Why Pain

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Mar 9, 2026
Your March Update from ICPCN

By Julia Downing | Project Leader

At the time of our last report we were preparing for our 4^th International children’s palliative care conference in Manila, Philippines. The conference, along with the celebration of our 20^th anniversary was an amazing time – so good to spend time together, to learn from each other, to be inspired by each other and to be reinvigorated for the work ahead. The 4th ICPCN International Conference on Children’s Palliative Care brought together clinicians, researchers, programme leaders, policymakers and advocates from around the world for an inspiring and energising three days of learning, connection and collaboration along with several pre-conference workshops. With participation from 420 delegates from over 50 countries, the conference demonstrated both the growth of and urgency for children’s palliative care (CPC) globally — and the shared commitment to strengthening services for vulnerable children and their families.

At the conference we launched our book of stories about children’s palliative care from around the world – Heart Strings, along with our 20^th Anniversary Impact report – both of which highlight the importance of and need for palliative care around the world. At a time when so much is happening around the world, we are acutely aware of the need to reduce suffering and to show compassion to others, and through our focus on children’s palliative care we do this.

Our pain app has been updated and is available on both android and apple – there are still a few bugs that need fixing but hopefully it will all be sorted soon. We are also busy advocating for access to pain management for children around the world, through our work with the WHO palliative care working group, a possible World Health Assembly side event in May, speaking at side events for the Commission for Narcotic Drugs (CND) and highlighting the need for access to controlled medicines for children in two recently published papers in the Lancet Child and Adolescent Journal – one looking at policy lessons, intervention priorities, and one addressing the scope, determinants and consequences of inequitable access to controlled medicines for children’s medial needs. We also published a paper looking at the global need for paediatric palliative care, and have other publications in the pipeline.

We continue to build capacity across the world for children’s palliative care and have been supporting a virtual training programme for nurses as well as face-to-face training in India, Pakistan, Lebanon amongst others. We continue to participate in conferences were appropriate, and are working hard on our advocacy activities as part of the WHO working group on palliative care.

There is so much going on with regards to children’s palliative care at the moment so please do check out our website for ongoing news about ICPCN and children’s palliative care globally.

Thank you again for your continued support.

Links:

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Oct 27, 2025
October Update!

By Julia Downing | Project Leader

#HatsOn4CPC

This is a busy time for all of us at ICPCN as we prepare for our 4^th International children’s palliative care conference being held in just a few weeks time in the Philippines. It is exciting to feel the momentum and excitement within the community as we prepare to meet up face-to-face for our first conference since 2018 when we were in Durban. As we prepare for this and for celebrating our 20^th anniversary there is much to do and much to be thankful for.

Our book on stories from around the world from families, as well as health professionals, board and staff members has gone to the printers and should be published in time for our conference. The book called ‘Heart Strings – stories shared of children’s palliative care’ includes stories from around the world – demonstrating the importance of children’s palliative care but also our global reach. It is important that amongst all the busyness, we should stop and listen to the voices of children and families and what it is like for them day to day while caring for a terminally ill child – the joys and the sadness – on this often lonely journey.

Earlier this month we celebrated #HatsOn4CPC Day. The second Friday in October is a day for raising international awareness of the need for children’s palliative care and the work of CPC services worldwide. The theme for this year was a birthday celebration for our 20^th anniversary and it was great to see the engagement from around the world, the photos and the events taking place to raise awareness for children’s palliative care globally – thank you to everyone who took part.

We are moving full steam ahead towards our conference being held in Manila from the 12^th-15^th November – please do come and join us as we celebrate all that is happening for children’s palliative care around the world, as well as our 20^th Birthday! The theme of the conference is milestones and horizons and whilst celebrating the milestones we also look ahead as to how we can continue to develop children’s palliative care around the world. We look forward to seeing many of you there.

We continue to build capacity across the world for children’s palliative care and have been supporting a virtual training programme for the EMRO region, one for Latin America and one aimed at nurses. We have also participated in several conferences including the African Palliative care conference and the SIOP conference. The WHO palliative care working group also took place last year and we are delighted to be working with the WHO and other partners on advocacy activities.

Please do check out our website for ongoing news about ICPCN and children’s palliative care globally, and to read our 20^th anniversary series! Please also look out as we launch our “Miles for Millions” campaign as we seek to raise funds for ICPCN.

Thank you again for your continued support.

#HatsOn4CPC

HatsOn

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