Children’s participation in the decision-making process on matters regarding their health. A Council of Europe video made by children for children.

TEDDY Kids engaged with the Council of Europe to develop a video for children on the right to participate in the decision-making process in health!

The video was developed by TEDDY Network and TEDDY Kids with a participatory methodology by a group of children aged between 12 and 18 years, coming from Italy, France, Greece and Albania, and which included young patients and healthy children, and it targets children of a similar age group.

The first step was to train the children involved about child rights and in particular the right to participation. The script and the video concept were developed on the basis of the most relevant documents (article of Oviedo Convention, UN Declaration of the Rights of the Child), further discussed with the secretariats of the CDBIO and CDENF and TEDDY kids and modified accordingly. Brainstorming sessions were organised to collect ideas and raise consensus on the scenario, the format, the animations, the animated characters etc.

The whole adventure has been a total collaboration between artists involved, the Council of Europe and children. From the choice of characters to the storyline, to giving voice to a young hero. The kids also chose to be themselves within the video but preferred to have the ‘patient’ main character as a cartoon. They felt that the world of ‘illness’ and ‘health’ would be better represented by an imaginary character as easier for a real young ‘patient’ to identify with. Young members of TEDDY Kids work during the pandemic connected online.