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Decisions during youth have great long-term impacts on human development, which is key to poverty alleviation and economic development. During adolescence, two of the primary transitions are beginning a family and adopting a healthy lifestyle. Youth face many choices and challenges around these key decisions, such as when to initiate sex, when to marry, when to have children, and whether to engage in risky behaviors - all of which affect their future health and future opportunities. Consequences of these early decisions can have long-lasting effects on adolescents and their communities, potentially increasing public health costs and depleting human capital. This note briefly presents program and policy approaches that have been implemented in different contexts for addressing these two key transition periods of youth: beginning a family and adopting a healthy lifestyle. It concludes by presenting a set of programmatic lessons and investment recommendations based on the global evidence.

Adolescent Health --- Adolescents --- Family Planning --- Family Planning Research --- Fertility --- Gender --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Maternal Health --- Nutrition --- Reproductive Health --- Youth

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Decisions during youth have great long-term impacts on human development, which is key to poverty alleviation and economic development. During adolescence, two of the primary transitions are beginning a family and adopting a healthy lifestyle. Youth face many choices and challenges around these key decisions, such as when to initiate sex, when to marry, when to have children, and whether to engage in risky behaviors- all of which affect their future health and future opportunities. Consequences of these early decisions can have long-lasting effects on adolescents and their communities, potentially increasing public health costs and depleting human capital. This policy brief discusses a situation analysis of adolescent girls in Malawi with respect to these transitions and highlights the challenges they face. Specifically, issues of reproductive health (fertility, maternal health, use of family planning), early marriage, use of family planning, nutrition and risky behaviors are analyzed and presented.

Adolescent Health --- Children and Youth --- Fertility --- Gender --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Reproductive Health --- Social Development

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Teenage pregnancies have potential negative consequences on the next generation. Children born to adolescent mothers are particularly at risk in terms of health, nutrition, cognitive and socio-emotional development. Evidence shows that the early years - especially the first 1,000 days - are crucially important for lifetime health, learning, and productivity. Particularly for the most vulnerable children and families, early childhood development (ECD) is a high return investment. This policy brief presents evidence on the health, nutrition and overall development of children in Zambia with a focus on those born to adolescent mothers. Analysis of issues such as infant and child mortality, malnutrition, incidence of illness, healthcare seeking behaviors, protective practices, late entry for school, pre-school experience and development are discussed.

Adolescent Health --- Child Health --- Cognitive Development --- Diarrhea --- Early Child and Children's Health --- Gender --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Nutrition --- Stunting

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Bias among health care providers can lead to poor-quality care and poor health outcomes, and it can exacerbate disparities. We use a randomized controlled trial to evaluate an intervention to reduce family planning provider bias towards young women in 227 clinics in Tanzania, Burkina Faso, and Pakistan. The intervention educated providers about bias towards young women, facilitated communication about bias with other providers, and offered non-financial public awards to clinics with the least biased care. After 12 months, the intervention led to less-biased attitudes and beliefs among providers and more comprehensive counseling. Clients also perceived better treatment at intervention clinics compared to control clinics. Despite reductions in reported bias, we find mixed evidence regarding changes in method dispensing