Africa's COVID-19 Story

COVID-19 created an obstacle for countries to navigate and construct policies that would help protect people. How did these policies in the African continent protect women & girls, who were disproportionately impacted? We attempt to answer this question by viewing each policies through a lens of gender sensitivity. We will then provide recommendations of where improvements could be made from a policy standpoint.  

Even within the continent, there appear to be widely varying levels of gender sensitivity at the policy level in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some countries, such as Rwanda, Egypt, and Uganda, have handled these issues well by centering women within their policies. However, there have been other countries that have not done as well. We provide analysis from a country and regional standpoint from the backdrop of COVID-19. 

Along with violence against women and girls (VAWG), women's economic security is a vital lens through which to analyze policy responses. COVID was unique from an economic perspective for many reasons. One reason is that in prior global recessions there was a larger employment drop for men than women. In these prior recessions, consumers would cut back spending more on durable goods, industries in which men are disproportionately employed and laid off during these recessions. However, the opposite was true during COVID - the service industry in which women are disproportionately employed was more impacted. 

In terms of explanations, on the demand side, more women are in service industries and more men are in production industries. In a typical recession, production industries are more impacted; however, during COVID, demand for services dropped more due to both government policy response and consumer demand reaction. On the supply side, in a typical recession, married women tend to actually enter or re-enter the workforce. However, during COVID, women exited the workforce, reducing the supply, partly due to childcare needs. This trend was especially true in Africa.