Children and COVID-19 Research Library

COVID-19 has affected men and women differently. Although more men have died from the pandemic, women’s mental health is taking a bigger toll, their workload at home has multiplied and their economic resources are dwindling. These effects are hard to capture, as social distancing measures have rendered traditional data collection methods impossible. In response to this challenge, UN Women’s Regional Office for Asia and Pacific turned to innovative solutions to pursue data collection at this critical time. UN Women engaged with national governments and mobile network operators to roll out a series of rapid assessment surveys in 11 Asia-Pacific countries.

Throughout history, women and girls have been affected negatively and at a disproportionately higher rate by the outbreaks of epidemics and pandemics, and COVID-19 hasn’t been an exception. Existing social and cultural norms and practices that underlie structures of systemic gender discrimination and marginalisation glaringly manifest themselves. Otherwise hidden and suppressed attitudes and practices are laid bare as communities and institutions resort to instincts to control and survive within emergency situations. In Africa, an intersection of factors leaves girls and adolescents at greater risk of marginalisation, discrimination and neglect. Gender and social norms have traditionally placed girls at a greater disadvantage than other segments of the population. Pandemics, like other crises, often result in the breakdown of social infrastructure and services, leading to health, transport, food, sanitation, legal, security and other governance structures being temporarily contracted or becoming dysfunctional. This may result in increased exposure of women and children to human rights abuses, including exposure to gender-based violence.

This is a personal reflection, as a female academic during Covid-19, on how women's academic productivity seems primarily to be discussed in relation to a different kind of productivity-motherhood. A recent procedure in a maternity hospital, evoked feelings and associations of mothering and being mothered, and how these associations hover over relationships regardless of whether wombs are productive or not. My hope in writing this piece, is that every woman's fear and anxiety may be productively contained (regardless of how she is seen from the outside or momentarily construed from within) during this time of extraordinary turmoil.

During the COVID‐19 crisis, being a working mother has taken on a whole new meaning, as mothers navigate working from home while juggling childcare, as well as coming to terms with their intersecting identities. The current article is a feminist, heartful autoethnographic account, couched in Relational‐Cultural Theory, surrounding our authentic experiences working from home and raising children during the worldwide pandemic. We explore academic motherhood, working from home, mental health, and coping during coronavirus and stay‐at‐home orders through engaged dialogue. We hope that showcasing our vulnerability can lead to change in the expectations we put on mothers in academia, while at the same time connect with readers who may be going through similar challenges.

While women were already doing most of the world’s unpaid care work prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, emerging research suggests that the crisis and its subsequent shutdown response have resulted in a dramatic increase in this burden. This policy brief builds on recent work on the care economy to explore implications of the COVID-19 pandemic and opportunities for addressing the burden of unpaid care work.

Experiences from previous pandemics and large-scale shocks show that these crises often affect men and women differently. Specifically, the effectiveness of policy actions and the prevention of costly reversals in the progress achieved towards greater gender equality will crucially depend on how gender considerations are reflected in the examination of potential impacts of and responses to COVID-19. Not only women and girls can be expected to be impacted differently, but they can also play different roles in the response vis-à-vis men and boys that could enhance the likelihood of success.

In an effort to address the impacts of COVID-19, companies are making a number of socially beneficial communications to the public. It is essential that these communications avoid harmful stereotypes and seek to depict positive and progressive gender portrayals. This document provides considerations for corporate entities currently creating socially beneficial communications.