e-Bulletin April 2025
World Health Day
Healthy Beginnings, Hopeful Futures
Visual credit: World Health Organization (WHO)
Every year on April 7, the world comes together to celebrate World Health Day to raise awareness about pressing health issues and promote healthier lives. This year’s theme, Healthy beginnings, hopeful futures, calls on governments and the health community to ramp up efforts to end preventable maternal and newborn deaths while prioritising women’s longer-term health and well-being.
We are proud to showcase projects from our School’s research teams that demonstrate the transformative impact of public health research and policy.
The “Children of 1997” birth cohort, initiated in Hong Kong in 1997, stands as one of the most impactful ongoing birth cohorts in the region. This study has generated over 80 scientific papers, exploring critical public health issues such as the harms of second-hand smoking, the relationship between breastfeeding and childhood hospitalisation for infections, the link between childcare types and obesity risk, and the association between air pollution and pubertal development. These studies have highlighted opportunities to improve women’s health.
With funding support from the Health Bureau, the Research Grant Council of the HKSAR Government, and the WYNG Foundation, a Biobank has been established to archive biospecimens from the birth cohort participants. These samples have been analysed using state-of-the-art high-throughput technologies, including metabolomics, microbiome profiling, proteomics, and genomics, providing invaluable data for understanding disease etiology and informing public health policies.
To enhance its impact, the “Children of 1997” birth cohort is part of several international consortia and collaborative projects, including the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration, the Global Lipids Genetics Consortium, and the Hong Kong Genome Project. These partnerships highlight the global significance of this work and its potential to improve population health worldwide.
Additionally, a research study led by Professor Chao Quan, Clinical Assistant Professor at our School, in collaboration with the School of Nursing of HKUMed, Duke-NUS Medical School (Singapore), and the University of British Columbia (Canada), has highlighted the significant benefits of extending paid maternity leave in Hong Kong.
In 2020, Hong Kong extended its statutory paid maternity leave from 10 to 14 weeks. The study, published in a prestigious healthcare journal Health Affairs, found that this policy change led to a 22% decrease in postnatal depressive symptoms among mothers and a 33% reduction in mothers reporting that baby care interfered with their emotional well-being.
The study also revealed that the extension did not lead to more mothers exiting the workforce. Instead, it supported the retention of highly skilled and educated female workers, demonstrating the dual benefits of the policy for both maternal mental health and workforce stability. These findings underscore the importance of evidence-based policy changes in improving maternal and child health, a key focus area for public health.
As we celebrate World Health Day 2025, we reaffirm our commitment to advancing public health through innovation, collaboration, and education. The challenges we face are complex, but with dedication and evidence-based solutions, we are confident in our ability to drive meaningful changes.
Learn more from our researchers’ publications:
Assessing the safety of lipid-modifying medications among Chinese adolescents: a drug-target Mendelian randomization study
BMC Medicine
Luo, Shan*; Lam, Hugh Simon; Chan, Yap Hang; Tang, Clara Sze Man; He, Baoting*; Kwok, Man Ki*; Leung, Gabriel M*; Schooling C Mary*; Au Yeung, Shiu Lun*
Extended paid maternity leave associated with improved maternal mental health in Hong Kong
Health Affairs
Andres, Ellie Bostwick; Du, Xinyu; Pang, Sharon Sze Lu; Liang, Jiayi Noel; Ye, Jiaxi; Lee, Ming Hin; Tarrant, Marie; Yung, Sofie Shuk-Fei; Johnston, Janice M.*; Lok, Kris Yuet Wan; Quan, Jianchao*
Worldwide trends in diabetes prevalence and treatment from 1990 to 2022: a pooled analysis of 1108 population-representative studies with 141 million participants
The Lancet
NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC)
Remarks:
* Member of School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong
