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Councillors and committees

Agenda item

Impact of Covid on new parents - update

Report of the Director of Public Health

Minutes:

The Committee received an update report on the impact of Covid on new parents and their babies.

 

National research has been carried out which gives a good indication of the issues faced by new parents and babies during the pandemic.  Findings by Ofsted showed that children’s communication and language development continued to be affected, with increased numbers being referred for additional support. There are also many children still lacking confidence in social settings, with some taking longer to settle into nursery than would have been expected prior to the pandemic. In addition, some children are lacking in the development of gross motor skills due to lack of physical activity, including access to large-scale play equipment during the pandemic.  There are also issues highlighted by the Ofsted report around recruitment and retainment of qualified staff since the start of the pandemic.  It was noted however, that these points cannot be assumed to represent the whole sector but rather to highlight challenges that some providers and children experienced.

 

A further report was published at the end of 2022 for the First 1001 Days Movement and the Institute of Health Visiting. The findings were highlighted and included; more young children exposed to stresses and adversities at home, the pandemic is having an ongoing impact on children’s health and development and many services are struggling to meet children’s needs.

 

It was acknowledged that it will be years until the impact of the pandemic on early development can be truly measured. There have been disparities in terms of outcomes for young people based on deprivation levels. It was also noted that some children thrived during lockdown due to the extra time at home with family.

 

Committee was reminded that Gateshead Council is eligible for funding to develop a network of Family Hubs. The main theme areas for these Hubs will be; parent-infant relationships and perinatal mental health support, infant feeding, parenting support and home learning environment to aid early years educational recovery. The funding for these areas is mainly in relation to the start for life offer (100 critical days – conception to age 2). However, the home learning environment funding is targeted at 3-4 year olds whose development has been negatively impacted upon by the pandemic. This will be evidence-based intervention through a number of programmes to support language, literacy, social and emotional development and self-regulation.

 

Through the Health Visiting Ages and Stages Questionnaire, this will help Health Visitors decide if a referral to the 0-4 Panel is required.  The data collected through the questionnaire has shown a drop in communication skills since 2020, however Gateshead still remains above the national average.  Currently 84.5% of children in Gateshead aged 2 - 2.5 years are at or above the expected level in communication skills.

 

The 0 to 4 Referral Meeting is unique to Gateshead and is aimed at those children identified as having additional needs. Developmental checks are carried out by the Health Visitor or key worker at nursery and this allows early identification of any developmental needs and referrals can be made to the 0 to 4 meeting. A number of services will be represented at those meetings and they work in a multi-agency way. The 0 to 4 referral meeting continued to support children throughout the pandemic. During the pandemic resource packs were developed by services to support children in terms of social communication and interaction skills.  It was reported that the number of referrals has increased since 2019/20, this may be because of the impact of Covid, however without doing further work into each individual case this can not be confirmed.  It was acknowledged that this shows that services are getting better at the early identification of developmental needs.

 

It was questioned as to when funding will be received for Family Hubs and when programmes will start. It was confirmed that the first tranche of funding was received in January and the second part of the year one funding is expected imminently. The Delivery Plan was submitted in December and Gateshead is the only North East local authority who got approved first time.  There are challenges however because the plan was not approved until the end of January so it has been hard to allocate spend as it is quite prescriptive.  It was acknowledged that the first requirement of the funding bid was to get delivery of one hub by the end of April, Gateshead will have four by that time.

 

It was reported that the Baby Box scheme was launched this week, this is a development box for some first time parents which will encourage reading, play and bonding. Work is underway to look at expanding this as part of the Family Hub offer. The Baby Box scheme is initially targeted towards the most deprived families.

 

RESOLVED    -           That the Committee noted the content of the report.

 

Supporting documents:

 

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