The pandemic has tested and even reversed progress in expanding women’s rights and opportunities. Women have not recovered lost jobs and income, hunger is on the rise, and school closures threaten girls’ educational gains. Women’s participation in government, research, and resource management remains far from equal. Vulnerable groups of women, including migrants, those with disabilities, and those affected by conflict, are frequently left behind. Disparities between rich and poor countries are preventing equal access to lifesaving COVID-19 vaccines and treatments, putting women in poorer countries at disproportionate risk. Moreover, despite women’s central roles in responding to COVID-19, including as front-line health workers, they do not have the leadership positions they deserve. Building forward differently and better will require placing women and girls at the centre of all aspects of response and recovery, including through gender-responsive laws, policies, and budgeting. “Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: The gender snapshot 2021” presents the latest evidence on gender equality across all 17 Goals, highlighting the progress made since 2015 but also the continued alarm over the COVID-19 pandemic, its immediate effect on women’s well-being and the threat it poses to future generations.
For the first time, the report also brings together the latest data for each indicator under Goal 5 to track global and regional progress towards gender equality. The assessment reveals a long road ahead. Globally, only 1 of the 18 indicators (including sub indicators) is assessed as being “close to target”. In two areas the current level is assessed as ‘far from target’. The full impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is not yet known but is expected to further erode progress. Strong legal and policy action as well as resources for implementation are critical to stem the tide and get back on track.
How do the Global Financing Facility, Gavi and Global Fund approach health system strengthening in their policies? How is cooperation between the 3Gs in this area developing? What is still needed to translate this into country contexts? Through this new report, produced jointly by Cordaid and Wemos, we tried to answer these questions…
Alice Murage summarizes her presentation made at a research seminar hosted by the Center for Gender & Sexual Health Equity on 25 May 2021. Her presentation shed light on the Canada’s COVID-19 policy response in light of the Gender Based Analysis Plus (GBA+). It is based on an analysis conducted for an upcoming journal article co-authored with Julia Smith.
What is GBA+?
Gender Based Analysis Plus (GBA+) is defined by the federal government’s department Women and Gender Equality Canada (WAGE) as an, “analytical process that provides a rigorous method for the assessment of systemic inequalities as well as a means to assess how diverse groups of women, men, gender diverse people may experience policies, programs, and initiatives”. It considers not only gender but also other intersecting identity markers such as race, ethnicity, age, different abilities, income level.
The government’s GBA+ commitment can be traced back to its 1995 commitment to advance gender equality as part of its ratification of the United Nations’ Beijing Platform for Action: A commitment that was augmented in the Action Plan on Gender-based Analysis (2016-2020). At the provincial level British Columbia, while not fully implementing the GBA+ framework, made a commitment in 2018 to ensure gender equality is reflected in all budgets, policies, and programs, and created a Gender Equity Office.
Prior research demonstrates that gender equity concerns and commitment are often neglected and deprioritized in public health crisis when, as Julia Smith put it, the ‘tyranny of the urgent’ takes over.
Canada, and the province of British Columbia, are relatively unique in their gender equity commitments and offer a critical case to explore gender equity considerations in light of COVID-19 response.
Our assessment of the GBA+
In this study, we analysed both government documents from the federal and provincial levels and the lived experiences of 36 key informants and interviewees from March-July 2020. We highlighted three key policy areas that the UN COVID-19 Global Response Tracker highlighted as critical for a gender-sensitive response – gender-based violence, economic security and unpaid care.
We found that the GBA+ was narrowly applied in the COVID-19 response.
Only two social and economic policies, implemented during the research period, met the definition of gender-sensitive measure. Both addressed gender-based violence where the approach was to fund shelters and sexual assault centers and virtual mental health services.
The overt focus on gender-based violence positioned women as victims, as opposed to highlighting their role in sustaining the COVID-19 response through their unpaid care work.
The focus on financial relief did not necessarily translate to meet needs nor ease the triple burden on women.
The implementation of the GBA+ mitigated, but did not reduce, inequalities nor offer protection against further rights violations.
Key take-aways
Gender-based violence:
“There was a case of domestic violence . . . it’s very triggering to be close in the proximity of my ex. And because our kid’s not going to daycare any more we have to do the exchanges in person.”
Government funding to shelters filled pre-existing funding needs and catered for new COVID-19 related demands such as requirements around physical distancing and creation of isolation units.
Shelter does not equal security. Some women made a difficult choice of staying in abusive situations because of perceived risk of exposure to COVID-19 in shelters.
Transition to virtual mental health support created barriers for many who lacked the technology and/or privacy for those who were self-isolating with abusive partners.
Drivers of gender-based violence included childcare interruptions which increased conflict and contact between separated parents, and court closures in cases of protracted conflict.
“Transition houses in BC have the highest rates of casual staff of any province or territory…folks move from house to house…And maybe work at a school or in a nursing home.”
Economic security:
“My fear was I don’t have food for my son in the fridge. That was my biggest fear because I know I have money in my bank account, but there is nothing in the store and I feel like I’m supposed to not take my son.”
Women were disproportionately impacted by loss in employment and reduced hours, partly due to their concentration in low-paid, part-time, or temporary work they were more likely to experience job losses and reduced hours. It was also a reflection of gender roles associated with the types of job that were likely to be done by women.
Many respondents reported received financial relief from the government and appreciated the simple application process. Relief had more than just financial impacts, as it also improved mental health and reduced anxiety.
Money, however, does not equal necessities. Single mothers shared how lack of childcare meant that they were not able to go to grocery stores or that they could not find what they needed because of supply shortages.
Eligibility criteria for the main benefits program for individuals (Canada Emergency Response Benefit – CERB) excluded newcomers, part-time workers, and essential workers who left employment out of fear of infection. The requirement of prior earning of at least $5,000 in 2019 is estimated to have excluded 175,000 workers. These barriers were mirrored at the provincial level with the eligibility for the BC Emergency Benefit for Workers tied to that of CERB.
“She was so stressed her hair was falling out in clumps … So, when the government came out and said there would be money for university students that they could apply for, I mean, she was just thrilled.”
Unpaid care work:
“I became, you know, the person responsible for the kids 24/7 and it sort of became obvious that I’m the person responsible for the kids…He doesn’t have to do anything.”
COVID-19 resulted in a triple burden primarily shouldered by women: Paid work; unpaid work (childcare, home schooling, increase care needs for elderly parents); and domestic and community management.
Financial support through funding of the childcare sector and increases to the Canada Child Benefit did not translate to access to childcare for many parents.
Unpaid care work came at a high cost for women. Mothers lost paid work or reduced their work hours; their work productivity reduced; they experienced increased level of stress, anxiety, and mom-guilty; and they did not find time or energy for self-care.
Home schooling resulted in educational gaps due to lack of technology and financial resources for some parents; newcomers facing language and knowledge barriers in facilitating home schooling; and parents with children with disability being cut off from services.
“His teacher sent the homework, and I should study first by myself and then explain to my son…that was a big headache for me because it’s so hard…I’m not good in English language and everything that we learned in school is different than here”
Our recommendations
Continue applying GBA+ assessments at the federal level and extend the practice to the provincial level.
GBA+ should not just recognize gendered risk in policy process but also indicate if related risks have been addressed.
Invest in addressing the drivers of gender-based violence alongside responses to it, including securing access to justice and childcare.
Centre lived experienced in the GBA+ and engage people in the policy processes. People we spoke to shared insightful and creative ways the government could have met their needs better.
Address gender norms that force women out of the labour market during crisis and find ways to ease the triple burden on women.
Ensure access to necessities, as well as finances.
Close the gender wage gap.
Address digital divide fault lines
Improve access to mental wellness services and support.
Adopt a gender-responsive pandemic plan. The Gender and COVID-19 Project team has developed a framework for creating a gender-responsive plan which highlights key priority areas to address
You will be taking charge of the US administration at a critical time for both the US and the world. The global covid-19 pandemic has infected more than 50 million people and 12 million Americans, caused the deaths of more than one million people, and is far from over. As we grieve lost family and friends, frontline health and other key workers battle stress and exhaustion, and the livelihoods of millions have been destroyed; this is the right time for America to rejoin the global community in health and lead the way.
The pandemic is deepening existing inequalities, including gender inequality, and that makes us all more vulnerable. We propose seven areas for action where the US can lead and offer support in building a stronger and more equal world…
The collection and use of quality gender data must be a priority for governments’ COVID-19 policy response and recovery efforts.
We lack the comparable data we need to track the long-term impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on women and girls over time, even though we know that data is a powerful tool to fight the pandemic and to inform daily decisions about health, social, and economic policy. Gender data is the bedrock of evidence-based decision making and without it, policymakers, donors, and governments will be unable to create informed policies to respond and recover from the coronavirus pandemic and to make progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.
This brief illustrates the broad picture of current gender data needs as it relates to COVID-19 response and SDG progress, and recommends actions governments can take to fill these gaps and build a more equitable future.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to unfold, the devastating toll on lives and economic well-being is already starkly apparent. In Canada, the COVID-19 crisis has had disproportionate economic, health and social impacts on cis and trans women, Two-Spirit and gender-diverse people, particularly those who are low-income, people with disabilities, are members of the LGBTQ+ communities, belong to Indigenous, Black, or racialized communities or are newcomers, refugees, immigrants and migrants.
Nationally, as of July 2020, around 56% of the cases and 54% of the deaths from COVID-19 have been experienced by women. This is in part because women are on the frontlines of the pandemic. In Canada, 81% of the health care and social assistance workforce is made up of women. Fifty-six percent of women workers are concentrated in occupations known as the 5Cs: caring, cashiering, catering, cleaning and clerical functions, many of which are deemed essential occupations. In contrast, only 17% of men workers are employed in these jobs. Such jobs for the large part cannot be done remotely; while higher-income workers in sectors such as finance or professional services are able to work from home more safely.
By Anita Raj, Nabamallika Dehingia, Anvita Dixit and Lotus McDougal
The literature on COVID-19 is shockingly vast when you consider that most nations have been contending with the impact from the virus for only about six months at most. Based on this literature, there are a few recognized cross-national findings with regard to risk and severity of impact, and one of the most well-recognized findings is that related to sex.
Men are significantly more likely than women to experience severe complications from COVID-19, including death. Evidence supports that higher odds of COVID-19 complications among men is biobehavioral in nature, affected by sex (e.g. women may mount a more adaptive immune response than men) and by social construction of gender (e.g., masculinity norms may result in men being less likely than women to engage in protective behaviors such as mask use or hand washing). However, the pandemic is harming women and girls, too, and differentially than is seen for men and boys, as noted in a recent Lancet paper on gender and COVID-19. The evidence-base is building in this area, but it remains emergent and requires more attention.
A quick google search of “COVID-19 and Gender” yields more than 26,000 papers as of 27 August 2020, suggesting a vast literature to guide our understanding on this issue. However, as part of our work at the Center on Gender Equity and Health at the University of California San Diego, an ongoing review of the peer-reviewed literature, pre-prints, and working papers (limited to English language papers focusing on at least one low- or middle-income country, with primary data analysis and a complete methods section) has yielded 157 eligible papers as of this same date.
This review is being conducted as part of EMERGE – an initiative focused on building the quality and quantity of gender equality and empowerment measures and data globally. A bibliography of research and summary of findings is available on our EMERGE- Gender and COVID-19 webpage. Rapidly available, high-quality data for decision-making is of vital importance in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic; this quality is often controlled by the process of rigorous, scientific peer-review. Recognizing the sometimes diverging timeframes of these needs, we include pre-prints and working papers in this review.
What does the published literature say?
One hundred and fifty-seven papers offering empirical evidence on gender and COVID-19 in low- and middle-income countries is excellent, given that papers date back only to the past six months and require available data on a pandemic that we are still actively working to understand. However, 41% of the papers (65) are from China, and only 14 articles from Sub-Saharan Africa, limiting the geographic range of our understanding. Further, peer-reviewed publications were almost exclusively limited to health rather than economic or social outcomes, likely due to greater rapidity of publications in medicine and public health relative to the social sciences, including economics; social science research is largely represented through working papers to date.
Findings from our review offer the following key insights supported across multiple studies and national settings:
The COVID-19 lockdown has led to an increase in gender-based violence. Studies from India, Argentina, and Peru show significant increase in number of calls made to domestic violence helpline centers.
Women are more likely than men to experience job loss as a consequence of the pandemic, a finding seen in Ethiopia and across Asia, particularly in informal sectors
Women’s leadership is proving highly valuable to help manage the pandemic. A recent analysis of 194 nations found that those with a woman leader were significantly more likely than those with a male leader to create a more rapid and impactful response to curbing the spread of the pandemic.
These findings clearly demonstrate the importance of including mental health as well as domestic violence supports as part of health programme responses for COVID-19, gender-specific considerations for economic policies designed to reduce the financial impacts of the pandemic, and opportunities for women’ leadership politically and economically for pandemic management. At the same time, we continue to see numerous areas recognized as in need, but with limited data to guide the response.
Areas with limited data
The issue of unpaid labor and disproportionate increases in domestic labor burdens for women under lockdown and social distancing circumstances is becoming well-documented, but less clear is whether more traditional restrictive gender norms are potentially increasing due to the current situation.
With regard to violence against women, few emerging studies have pointed to women and girls’ experiences of violence and abuse under lockdowns, though there is a lack of geographical representation as well as inadequate information regarding social protections against such abuse.
Women and girls likely have more limited access to key women and girls’ health and hygiene products and services. Yet, we found no data on whether and how women and girls are getting reproductive health services and menstrual products, for example.
Building a gendered response to COVID-19 requires robust evidence on gender and COVID-19. While we are at a good starting place for this work, we need greater expansion of research by geography and topic, and we need greater advocacy of use of the research to ensure that women and girls do not fall further behind because of this pandemic.
While there is widespread recognition of global health failures when it comes to infectious disease outbreaks, there is little discussion on how policy-makers and global health organizations can learn to better prepare and respond. Serious games provide an underutilized tool to promote learning and innovation around global health crises. In order to explore the potential of Serious Games as a policy learning tool, Global Affairs Canada, in collaboration with the Department of National Defense and academic partners, developed and implemented a matrix game aimed at prompting critical reflection and gender-based analysis on infectious disease outbreak preparedness and response. This commentary, written by the core development team, reflects on the process and outcomes of the gaming exercise, which we believe will be of interest to others hoping to promote innovative thinking and learning around global health policy and crisis response, as well as the application of serious games more broadly.
Women hold 70% of jobs in the health workforce, but when a health emergency strikes we hear the message: ‘Step aside, ladies, men coming through to fix this’.
The current COVID-19 crisis has been no different. Women are the experts who know the most about the health systems they keep functioning, day in and day out. But COVID-19 task forces and other decision-making groups are on average less than 20% female.
This study aims to analyze South Korea’s experience during the COVID-19 outbreak through a gendered lens. We briefly introduce the COVID-19 outbreak in Korea, scrutinize gendered vulnerability in contracting the virus, and then analyze the gendered aspects of the pandemic response in two phases: quarantine policy and mitigation policy. The authors elicit four lessons from the analysis. First, gender needs to be mainstreamed at all stages of a public health emergency response. Second, in addition to medical care, all formal and informal care work should be considered as an essential component of health care systems. Third, a people-centered approach in health governance should be prioritized to make women’s voices heard at every level. Fourth, medical technology and resources to cope with pandemic should be produced and distributed in an equitable manner, acknowledging differential vulnerability and susceptibility.
We meet online every month to discuss key issues, activities, opportunities and ideas for collaboration. We have a long and growing list of resources on gender and public health emergencies.
We meet online every month to discuss key issues, activities, opportunities and ideas for collaboration. We have a long and growing list of resources on gender and public health emergencies.
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