Preventing Separation

Children are highly vulnerable to separation from their parents in conflict, displacement or disasters. Families may flee for their safety and lose loved ones in the chaos, parents may leave their children or send them away for their own safety or in the belief they will be better cared for by others. Children may lose their parents to disease, injury or death, while others may be abducted by armed forces, or trafficked.

Relevant authorities and organizations should provide coordinated action to reduce separation and endeavour to keep children as close to their parents, relatives and community as possible. When the possibility of separation can be anticipated, such as when an attack is possible or a movement of a population is anticipated or planned, community education should be undertaken. Families should be alerted to the risks of separation and encouraged to take precautions. Such precautions may include ensuring their child has undergone birth registration, teaching children their full names and addresses, encouraging children to wear name tags at all times, agreeing on a meeting place in case of separation, and making sure children are accompanied by a known adult whenever possible. This is particularly important when there are high risks of sexual violence, abduction and trafficking. In circumstances where the evacuation of a population is necessary, family groups should be moved together. Children should not be evacuated on their own.

Agencies should endeavour to avoid unnecessary separation by ensuring that households have adequate basic provisions. All services such as food aid, health services, and emergency care should be reviewed to ensure they do not encourage the separation or abandonment of children.

This section includes information on the causes of separation, how to assess a situation, and guidance on community messages and practices to reduce the incidence of children becoming separated.

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Introducing Guidance for Alternative Care Provision During COVID-19: Policy Makers

READY: Global Readiness for Major Disease Response, 28 Jan 2021

This second webinar in the 'Introducing Guidance for Alternative Care Provision During COVID-19' webinar series hosted on 28 January 2021, is aimed at policy makers and explains their role in developing policies and guidance to prevent family separation during an outbreak.

Introducing Guidance for Alternative Care Provision During COVID-19: For Health Practitioners

READY: Global Readiness for Major Disease Response, 27 Jan 2021

The first webinar, hosted on 27 January 2021, is aimed at health practitioners with the goal of introducing the guidance and helping practitioners understand their role in preventing family separation and supporting unaccompanied and separated children.

Safeguarding Resource and Support Hub

The Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action, 2021

The Safeguarding Resource and Support Hub (RSH) aims to support organisations in the aid sector to strengthen their safeguarding policy and practice against Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Sexual Harassment (SEAH).

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Nurturing care for children living in humanitarian settings

World Health Organization (WHO), 10 Dec 2020

This brief summarizes actions that programme planners and implementers should take to minimize the impact that emergencies have on the lives of young children and their families.

Minimum Standards for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action & INSPIRE strategies: A Guide to Complementarity and Use in Humanitarian Action

The Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action, Global Child Protection Area of Responsibility, the Global Partnership to End Violence against Children, UNHCR, UNICEF, 21 Sep 2020

The purpose of this note is to clarify the linkages and complementarity between INSPIRE seven strategies for ending violence against children and the 2019 Edition of the Minimum Standards for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action (‘2019 CPMS’); and to provide some practical guidance on how to use INSPIRE and the 2019 CPMS in conjunction for preventing and responding to violence against children in humanitarian settings.

Procedimiento sustantivo realizado por la Procuraduría General de la Nación para prevenir la separación familiar innecesaria en Guatemala, Quetzaltenango y Zacapa

Changing the Way We Care, 01 Jun 2020

El objetivo principal del informe es sistematizar el procedimiento sustantivo en los Departamentos de Guatemala, Quetzaltenango y de Zacapa realizado por Procuraduría General de la Nación (PGN) en el que se individualiza el tipo de amenaza o vulneración en el caso concreto e identifica si la misma puede ser resuelta mediante una intervención gubernamental específica, sin necesidad de intervención jurisdiccional y su análisis. El documento contiene un estudio del Sistema de Gestión para la Atención Integral de la Niñez y la Adolescencia, en relación al funcionamiento por parte de la Procuraduría General de la Nación de Quetzaltenango, Guatemala y Zacapa, y un análisis de casos resueltos judicialmente en Zacapa que podrían haberse tramitado previamente en la vía administrativa y evitar la institucionalización (gatekeeping mechanism en ingles)

Promoting child-friendly approaches in the area of migration: Standards, guidance and current practices

The Council of Europe, 01 Dec 2019

This compilation contributes to the implementation of the objectives of the Action Plan on protecting refugee and migrant children in Europe, adopted by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, by bringing together international and European standards on child-friendly practices in the context of migration with illustrations from practice of the kind of initiatives, programmes and procedures that serve to implement these standards.

Child Protection Services Needed During Armed Conflicts

Murli Desai - Rights-based Integrated Child Protection Service Delivery Systems, 18 Sep 2019

The aim of this module from the book Rights-based Integrated Child Protection Service Delivery Systems is to learn about the child protection services needed during armed conflicts.

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Explore, Engage, Act! Children and Young People and the Global Compact on Refugees and for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration

Hannah Mehta - Initiative for Child Rights in the Global Compacts, 21 Feb 2019

This publication is aimed at children and young people (and adults too!) so that they know what the governments of the world have said they will do. As the Global Compacts can be difficult to read, this ‘child and youth friendly’ briefing summarizes what these documents say about migrant and refugee children and young people.

Country Care Review: Philippines

Better Care Network , 16 Oct 2018

This country care review includes the care related Concluding Observations adopted by the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.