More child sickness expected

Expect more sick children in hospital emergency departments, an emeritus professor and retired paediatrician warns, as the Government’s easing of Covid-19 social contact rules collides with its slow action on child poverty.

Two reports on child poverty released this week show the plight of New Zealand’s most vulnerable children, while the easing of public health pandemic restrictions will increase the circulation of viruses and bacteria and land more children in hospital with preventable diseases.

‘‘As we open things up, then we have these children at risk again of high hospitalisation rates,’’ Dr Innes Asher explained.

A Child Poverty Action Group stocktake, co-authored by Asher and released yesterday, found that the Government has failed to fully meet any of the 42 recommendations made by its own Welfare Expert Advisory Group in 2019.

If enacted, Asher says they would have cushioned the blow for society’s most vulnerable children, with research showing an extra 18,000 were pushed into poverty in the first year of the pandemic. Roughly one in five Kiwi children is in a household that receives a benefit.

But the Government had made some progress, including increasing benefits in May – a move it projected would lift between 19,000 and 33,000 out of poverty by mid-2022.

Meanwhile, the Child Poverty Monitor, released on Monday, showed the Government was largely on track to meet its targets by March 2020, but Mā ori, Pacific children, and disabled children or those living with a disabled caregiver were still left behind.

Asher said the problem was ‘‘dire’’, and bold action was needed immediately to stop more children living below the breadline. ‘‘We need to take big, bold steps.’’