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Abstract
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As of June 2022, there had been over 246 million cases of COVID-19 worldwide, and countless public health restrictions enacted to slow disease spread (World Health Organization, 2021b). Women and vulnerable populations, such as individuals experiencing gender-based violence (GBV), have borne the brunt of the unintended consequences associated with these public health restrictions, with the United Nations (2022) identifying three key areas where COVID-19 and public health responses have contributed to gender inequity: increased job and income loss, unpaid care work, and violence against women and girls.
COVID-19 resulted in unprecedented disruptions to global economies. Income loss has been attributed to a reduction in work hours, a trend observed across all genders during COVID-19 (Carli, 2020; Collins et al., 2021). However, this reduction was not experienced equally across genders, as women reported a decrease in work hours 4 to 5 times greater than men (Collins et al., 2021). Beyond reduced hours and the associated income loss, preliminary studies on the early effects of COVID-19 indicated there were no gender differences among those who temporarily lost their jobs (Dang & Nguyen, 2021). However, differences emerged when lay-offs ended and workers were to return to work; specifically, due to increased unpaid caregiving demands including childcare and elder care, women were at higher risk of permanently losing their jobs than men and disproportionately left the workforce voluntarily or reduced their work hours (Carli, 2020; Petts et al., 2021). This was due, in part, to public health restrictions that closed childcare centers and schools, a step deemed necessary to help reduce community transmission, but enacted at a significant cost to families, especially women. While in two-parent heterosexual families both parents reported exhaustion and reduced capacity for paid employment, this was worse for mothers (Bender et al., 2022; Lyttelton et al., 2021). The impact of income and job loss experienced by all genders has left families vulnerable, and the disparities in income and job losses for women has further widened the gender pay gap by an estimated 20-40% (Collins et al., 2021).
The intersection of familial, financial, and pandemic-related stress heightened the risk of experiencing violence, a trend previously observed during times of crisis (United Nations, 2022). GBV can be understood as any harmful act directed at an individual based on their gender and is rooted in gender inequality, the abuse of power, and harmful norms (Heise, Ellsberg, & Gottmoeller, 2002). GBV is a serious threat to the wellbeing of survivors, with health consequences such as physical injury, anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and fear as well as financial consequences such as decreased access to health care and transportation (Canadian Medical Association, 2021; Cotter, 2021; World Health Organization, 2021a). Emerging evidence indicated both the incidence and prevalence of GBV increased during the COVID-19 pandemic with one in two women reporting that they or a woman they know experienced violence during the pandemic (Peterman et al., 2020; Roesch et al., 2020; United Nations, 2022). Specifically, in Canada, there was a reported 20-30% increase in violence, with domestic violence calls in Ontario increasing by 22% in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic (Illingsworth & Ferrera, 2020)...
Language: en |