The state of child development in Canada: Are we moving toward, or away from, equity from the start?

Abstract

Young children have a remarkable capacity for developmental plasticity in response to the environments where they grow up, live and learn. In recognition of this capacity, the World Health Organization International Commission on the Social Determinants of Health recommended in 2008 that "governments build universal coverage of a comprehensive package of quality early child development programs and services for children, mothers, and other caregivers, regardless of ability to pay". Yet, in its recent report card on early learning and care, the United Nations Children's Fund revealed that Canada met only one out of 10 benchmarks, tying for last place with Ireland out of 26 wealthy countries. Not surprisingly, in Canada, large socioeconomic disparities emerge early in life in children's physical, social/emotional and language/cognitive development, which are largely attributable to systematic differences in the nature of their early environments. Moreover, there is evidence of decline in the state of early child development in Canada in recent years, concurrent with increasing economic and time pressures on families. To date, Canada has had the weakest public policy response (among the wealthy countries) to the emerging understanding of the importance of the early years. If recent activities and initiatives in Ontario, Quebec, the Canadian Senate and several other provinces are fully realized, Canada will begin to close the gap between what we know and what we do in the early childhood years.