Fighting a double pandemic

Context: With the COVID-19 epidemic, there is also a rising threat of domestic and gender-based violence.

Anecdote: With the COVID-19 epidemic, there is an escalation in the risk millions face from domestic and gender-based violence

Parallel Pandemic: Impact on Women:

• Alarming escalation of violence: at home with the women bearing the brunt of frustration and anger.

• 25% Rise in emergency call helplines; 300% rise in Internet searches for support for those affected by domestic violence.
• Women have been prevented from seeing doctors and female doctors being spat on while testing other women for COVID-19

• Women at more disadvantaged: because of defined gender roles restricting them to unpaid work and harmful practices (Forced marriages)

• In West Africa, 60% of the total deaths in the 2014 Ebola virus outbreak were women.
• A 53% rise in domestic violence following the Canterbury earthquake in New Zealand.
• 70% of the health workers are women leading them squarely into infection’s path.

• Entrenched learning gaps: between girls and boys due to mass school closures putting girls at risk of sexual exploitation, early pregnancy, and forced marriages.
• Non-availability of relief: With violence shelter being converted into COVID facilities; police and health workers restricted to visit homes and courts being forced to close added to their miseries.

Way Forward:

• Ensure women as the center of the post-COVID-19 recovery plan: by exploring collaborations and mechanisms.
• Increasing access to healthcare including mental healthcare: All evidence points to a clear link between weak health systems and vulnerabilities to domestic violence.
• Make women financially independent: A dedicated funding and support for micro, small, and medium-sized businesses and the informal sector, predominantly led by women.
• Sharing resources and creating opportunities: through virtual meetings and webinars to best navigate the evolving processes and circumstances.
• Keep domestic violence refuges: open during the outbreak.
• Continued access to justice: ensured through useful innovations like virtual hearings and legal advice.
• Identifying the economic cost to gender-based violence: A study of Seychelles conducted on The Economic Cost of Violence against Women and Girls shows that gender-based violence leads to costs of 4.625% of GDP.