Child Maltreatment and Long-Term Physical and Mental Health Outcomes: An Exploration of Biopsychosocial Determinants and Implications for Prevention.

Child maltreatment rates remain unacceptably high and rates are likely to escalate as COVID-related economic problems continue. A comprehensive and evidence-building approach is needed to prevent, detect and intervene where child maltreatment occurs. This review identifies key challenges in definitions, overviews the latest data on prevalence rates, reviews risk and protective factors, and examines common long-term mental health outcomes for children who experience maltreatment. The review takes a systems approach to child maltreatment outcomes through its focus on the overall burden of disease, gene-environment interactions, neurobiological mechanisms and social ecologies linking maltreatment to mental ill-health. Five recommendations relating to the accurate measurement of trends, research on brain structures and processes, improving the reach and impact of teleservices for detecting, preventing and treating child maladjustment, community-based approaches, and building population-focused multidisciplinary alliances and think tanks are presented.

Applying a public health approach to identify priorities for regulating child product safety.

OBJECTIVE: To identify leading injury risk factors and jurisdictional differences in Australian and US child-related product safety regulatory responses to inform the development of Australian policy and reform priorities. METHODS: The study established and evaluated a knowledge base of child-related product safety regulatory responses (recalls, bans, standards and warnings) made in Australia and the US over the period 2011-17 to identify risk factors and potential regulatory gaps. RESULTS: The research identified 1,540 Australian and US child-related product safety regulatory responses with the most common response type being product safety recall, and the leading product hazards in responses being choking, fire, fall, strangulation and chemical hazards. Jurisdictional differences identified potential regulatory gaps in Australia related to chemical hazards and high-risk durable infant and toddler products, and some data deficiencies in Australian responses. CONCLUSIONS: Priorities include the need to improve the prevention orientation of the Australian product safety framework, to create an intelligence platform to assess injury risks more precisely and to address regulatory gaps related to the use of toxic chemicals in children's products and high-risk durable infant and toddler products. IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC HEALTH: The study demonstrates the identification of policy and reform priorities for child product safety using a public health lens.