A Rhode Island man is being referred to as a hero, an angel, and even Spider-Man after he leaped into action to save a 2-year-old child he saw walking on a roof. The toddler climbed out of a window that her mother left open because it was hot in their apartment, according to police. The man wished to remain anonymous. “I just kept thinking, ‘Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. The baby’s going to fall,'” onlooker Michelle Higgins told WJAR. “The baby was really coming to the...

Moving beyond efforts to block expansion of health care for the poor and disabled, Republican governors in 15 states are now rejecting a new, federally funded summer program to give food assistance to hungry children.

The program is expected to serve 21 million youngsters starting around June, providing $2.5 billion in relief across the country.

A retrospective study revealed that hospital admission rates were far higher for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) than for the omicron strain of SARS-CoV-2 or influenza A/B in children presenting at Swedish emergency departments (EDs) from August 2021 to September 2022.

Hospitalization rates were 81.7% for RSV, 31.5% for omicron, and 27.7% for influenza, Dr. Pontus Hedberg and researchers from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm reported. The results appeared in a JAMA Pediatrics.

As noted in our previous reporting, almost half the U.S. population is struggling to find adequate access to child care, according to a report from the Center for American Progress, and the rate is closer to 60% in rural areas.

During the first two years of the pandemic almost 20,000 child care centers permanently closed — nearly one in 10. Many child care workers lost their jobs or left for better options, and while there has been some recovery, the industry still has approximately 40,000 fewer positions than it did in early 2020.

The Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip has left the health sector in the besieged coastal enclave in a state of unprecedented, near-total collapse, according to an investigation by +972 Magazine and The Intercept. The dire conditions were prompted by Israel’s intensive bombardment, sometimes targeting hospitals and surrounding areas, along with power cuts, shortages of fuel and medical supplies, and an exponential increase in injuries.

Millions of families are at risk of losing child care after this weekend when emergency funding allocated to providers during the coronavirus pandemic expires. Congress faces a Saturday deadline to act before the $24 billion Child Care Stabilization Program ends, putting thousands of day care centers, preschools and other child care centers in jeopardy.

A pandemic-era child care investment is set to run out this month, threatening to upend preschools and day care facilities across the country and set back economic recovery touted by President Joe Biden.

After a $24 billion investment from Biden's American Rescue Plan runs out, the ability for these entities to operate at the same level is expected to be stunted, and people who ventured back into the workplace after the peak of COVID-19 might be forced to leave those jobs due to unavailable or unaffordable child care.

The government on Friday announced a policy draft of what Prime Minister Fumio Kishida calls “unprecedented steps” to reverse Japan’s declining birthrate, including beefing up child care allowances and expanding scholarships for college education.

The proposals, announced by Masanobu Ogura, the minister in charge of policies for children, also include systems that improve child care services, encourage co-parenting and support single parents.

Facing a divided Congress unlikely to pass major legislation, President Joe Biden’s administration is now cajoling or working with private companies to advance an otherwise stymied policy agenda on everything from prescription drug costs to expanding child care options.

Ben & Jerry’s is among the companies whose supply chains utilize migrant child labor, often in violation of child labor laws, despite the company’s self-proclaimed progressive values and vowing to "honor and stand with" immigrants.