This policy brief draws on qualitative research relating to young parents and their children in seven communities (urban and rural) who are part of the Young Lives longitudinal study of 3,000 young people in Ethiopia.  The analysis reveals the gendered roles that young mothers and fathers play in childcare and children’s health, the norms and structures that drive the unequal sharing of that care, and how young parents use health services.

This policy brief follows working paper: Tiumelissan, A., K. Birhanu, A. Pankhurst and V. Vinci (2020) “Caring for a baby is a mother’s responsibility”: Parenting and Health Service Experiences of Young Mothers and Fathers in Young Lives Communities in Ethiopia, Young Lives Working Paper 195, Oxford: Young Lives and is one of a set of eight briefs summarising key findings and policy implications from eight corresponding working papers based on the research for the Young Lives fifth-wave qualitative survey in 2019.