Abstract
Data resource basics The World Health Organization (WHO) and the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) developed the Global School-based Student Health Survey (GSHS) in collaboration with United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS). The aim of the GSHS was to generate comparable data from students aged 13 to 17 years which could inform school and youth health policies and programmes around the world.¹ Whereas global paediatrics has generally focused on infancy and childhood, adolescence is increasingly recognized as a critical period for health outcomes during adulthood.2–5 Presently, there are approximately 1.86 billion individuals aged 10 to 24 years old worldwide (24% of the global population).⁶ Although the adolescents’ right to health has been established in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, adolescent health, development and wellbeing have received little attention in global health and social policies.⁵,⁷ Adolescence, in particular, offers a window of opportunity to influence or prevent behaviours that contribute to diseases in adulthood and which commonly emerge and manifest between the ages of 11 and 24 years.⁸,⁹ In addition, adolescent mortality accounts for an increasing number of premature deaths, as a result of the epidemiological transition and a decline in infant mortality.