Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in Health

Excellencies,

Ambassadors, 

Representatives of the UK Mission in China,

Friends, Ladies, and Gentlemen,

Greetings!

I welcome all of you to this joint dialogue co-hosted by the UN in China and the UK Mission in Beijing, with particularly brilliant support from UN Women, UNFPA, UNICEF, and WHO, to emphasise the pivotal role of women in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, and to promote gender equality and health in South-South Cooperation. It is wonderful to see so many female leaders, colleagues, and friends in the audience today.

The UN in China is working closely with the UK Mission, establishing a series of events to address these issues, and to promote women and health related targets. The UN’s work in China centralizes both gender equality and women’s empowerment, to deliver on the Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework 2021-2025.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is significant – the economic downturn caused by the pandemic has been devastating for all. It is evident that COVID-19 has reinforced traditional social and cultural gender norms. Women have always borne a greater domestic burden as compared to men, and this has been exacerbated by the pandemic, forcing many to leave the workforce in order to support unpaid domestic care at home.[1] Among the millions of populations pushed back into poverty, women and girls are the hardest-hit in the economic fallout of the pandemic.[2]

Furthermore, COVID-19 has resulted in larger employment losses for women compared to men, especially for those industries and jobs in which women make up the majority, such as service and healthcare sectors[3].Indeed, female healthcare workers have played crucial roles in pandemic response and management, not only exposing themselves at the frontlines to higher risks of infection at the cost of their physical wellbeing, but also coping with the risks to mental health and stress. Apart from the deepening economic and social stress coupled with restricted movement and social isolation measures, gender-based violence is increasing exponentially. In other words, from health to the economy, security to social protection, what we are witnessing right now are the exacerbated impacts of COVID-19 for women and girls simply by virtue of their sex.[4]

The impacts of the pandemic on women’s economic empowerment are long-lasting. The ideals of the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action – a key UN document setting out the agenda and roadmap to realize gender equality and empower women and girls worldwide, have not been reached.

According to UNESCO, the COVID-19 pandemic and its unprecedented disruption to education have meant that an estimated 11 million girls may not return to school – this includes girls aged 12-17 in lower-income countries, at risk of dropping out of school altogether. You can imagine the devastating impacts that would lead to.[5]  

More significant action and investments are urgently needed to ensure that women and girls truly count and to realize Good Health and Well-Being (SDG 3) and Gender Equality (SDG 5) as we strive together to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. As proposed by the UN Secretary-General Mr. António Guterres, we must realize women’s rights fully; ensure equal representation; advance women’s economic education to public institutions; advance women’s economic inclusion; enact an emergency response plan in each country to address violence against women and girls; and overall, give space to the intergenerational transition that is underway.

As a feminist and a male ally to women’s empowerment, I myself have strived to promote women in health through my work, both in China and in my previous roles. As UNRC to Kenya, we delivered through a Public-private partnership across the government and companies, including Huawei and Merck, to ensure that women had access to adequate antenatal and postnatal care services in remote locations. We were able to successfully drive down maternal mortality rates, achieving a reduction of up to one-third in the highest-burden counties of Kenya, as acknowledged by the World Economic Forum in 2017.

For the UN in China, our Country Team has a strong gender mandate. We collaborate to promote SDG 5 through our UN Gender Theme Group – co-chaired by UN Women and UNFPA, in order to ensure that gender remains a key priority across all of our operations in the country.

Throughout the month of March, we are pleased to collaborate with the UK Mission in China to deliver a series of events on gender equality and female empowerment. On the 8th of March, I spoke at the British Ambassador’s Residence on the role of global leaders in promoting gender equality, and today we are highlighting the role of women in health at the UN Compound. The third and final event in this series, on women in climate, will take place next week on the 29th of March at the British Ambassador’s Residence.

Thank you, Excellencies, for joining us today to discuss these significant issues regarding gender equality and health. I am delighted to welcome such distinguished panelists across UN, UK, and China to share perspectives on their areas of expertise. 

I look forward to the fruitful discussions of today.

[1] COVID-19: How women are bearing the burden of unpaid work | World Economic Forum (weforum.org)

[2] Whose-time-to-care-brief_0.pdf (unwomen.org)

[3] COVID-19 She-Cession: The Employment Penalty of Taking Care of Young Children (imf.org)

[4] policy_brief_on_covid_impact_on_women_9_april_2020.pdf (un.org)

[5] Girls’ education and COVID-19: New factsheet shows increased inequalities for the education of adolescent girls (unesco.org)