'Damage is incalculable': Coronavirus pandemic is 'most discriminatory crisis' for women

Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, the head of UN Women has termed the COVID-19 pandemic "the most discriminatory crisis" that women and girls have ever experienced. She further highlighted that women lost jobs far more often than men as 47 million women were pushed into living on less than $1.90 a day this year. She further revealed that the world faces an increase in child marriage. There has been a 59 per cent increase in women having to spend more time on domestic work since the pandemic began. The pandemic has also contributed to a digital gender gap. 

"Big bold steps"

The latest report by the World Health Organization (WHO) shows that the highest rates of intimate partner violence in the past 12 months was mostly against young women aged 15 to 24. "Violence against women in public life is a major deterrent to their political participation, and affects women of all ages and ranks, in every part of the world", said Mlambo-Ngcuka. She was speaking at the opening of the annual meeting of the Commission on the Status of Women. The theme this year is on women’s participation and in public life and combatting violence against women and girls. Mlambo-Ngcuka urged to take "big, bold steps". Also, she asked the global leaders to make space for young women to enter public life. "We see them on the streets across the world, leading movements even in the face of lethal threat", she said.

UN Women’s Mlambo-Ngcuka highlighted that there are certain gains “to celebrate and inspire us”, pointing towards the increase in the share of women in the Lithuanian government from 8 per cent to 43 per cent. She also highlighted Rwanda leading the world with the largest share of women ministers at 54.8 per cent. Also, the percentage of women ministers in the United States rising from 17 per cent in 2020 to 46 per cent in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet, "a historic high". However, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that despite these developments, men are dominating decision-making during the pandemic. 

He said, “A study of 87 countries found that 85 percent of COVID-19 task forces contained mostly men”. He added, “What we need is not more training for women, but to train those in power on how to build inclusive institutions. We need to move beyond fixing women and instead fix our systems”. 

(Image Credits: PTI)