Centring sexual and reproductive health and justice in the global COVID-19 response

Abstract

Global responses to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19) pandemic are converging with pervasive, existing sexual and reproductive health and justice inequities to disproportionately impact the health, wellbeing, and economic stability of women, girls, and vulnerable populations. People whose human rights are least protected are likely to experience unique difficulties from COVID19. 1 Women, girls, and marginalised Centring sexual and reproductive health and justice in the global COVID-19 response unmonitored isolation, from the effects of COVID19, as well as loneliness and mental health deterioration. The risks of using CHWs in this way could be reduced by supervision, with independent monitoring and evaluative research to identify problems early and correct them. The CHWs could visit in pairs to reduce the risks.People might resist or be reluctant to be visited by CHWs, and they could opt out of home visits at any time, but experience with CHWs in Brazil in the past 30 years suggests this would happen rarely. 4 In Brazil, 250 000 CHWs provide a much needed and relied upon service. CHWs in Brazil have been established for many years, are well integrated into their communities, and provide a wide range of health and social care support activities to each of the 100-150 households that they are responsible for. Therefore, in Brazil, additional roles for preventing the spread of and supporting those infected with COVID19 or in selfisolation could be integrated into the work of CHWs. Much can be learned from countries with successful experiences of radical, largescale workforce interventions. 9 It could be argued that this is an unrealistic proposal and that adapting the existing system or training so many people is too challenging. However, current health and social care systems in the UK are under extreme pressure and could become overwhelmed. In a time of fear, isolation, and growing health inequalities, 10 use of CHWs for the COVID19 response would boost social coherence and fill gaps that have begun to emerge between health and social care and inperson and virtual access to health care. Our proposal for CHWs would produce a large cadre of people with an understanding of basic epidemiological and public health concepts 11 who could challenge scientific misinformation and explain the rationale for specific health policies and interventions to the public. This approach would also help build a new generation of leaders who can help tackle the complex challenges of our age.

SARS‐CoV‐2, testosterone and frailty in males (PROTEGGIMI): A multidimensional research project

“…In this context, the first retrospective case series published on a large cohort of consecutive patients with laboratory-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 referred for intensive care unit (ICU) admission to the coordination center of the SARS-CoV-2 in the ICU Network of the Lombardy region in Italy clearly depicted a dramatic snapshot: of 1591 patients, extraordinarily 1304 (82%) were males at the final follow-up at March 25, 2020 4 . Similar trends have also been reported in other countries 5 .…”

HIV and Food Insecurity: A Syndemic Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…The health [7], social [8,9], and economic [4,5,10] impacts of COVID-19 may interfere with the availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods as well as the ability for people, including PLWH, to acquire food in socially acceptable ways. As indicated by reports of increasing food bank usage [24,25], it is reasonable to suggest that food insecurity among PLWH, along with its consequences (i.e., lower CD4 cell counts [37], incomplete HIV viral load suppression [38], and sub-optimal HIV treatment adherence [39]), may become more common.…”

“…In addition to the health [7] and social [8,9] impacts, the economic impacts of COVID-19, at both the micro-and macro-levels, have been unprecedented: long-standing businesses are shuttering [4,5], unemployment levels are climbing [10], and some countries are now reporting shrinking economies in Quarter 1, 2020 for the first time in more than a decade [11][12][13]. For example, in March 2020, Statistics Canada reported that more than one million jobs were lost in Canada, the worst single-month change on record [14].…”

Impact of COVID-19 on Transgender Women & Hijra: Insights from Gujarat, India

“…However, their situation is not known. Various studies have been conducted to understand the impact of the pandemic on people who are infected, other affected and vulnerable people, healthcare workers, etc since the inception of COVID-19 pandemic (for example, Armitage & Nellums, 2020;Banerjee et al, 2020;Hall et al, 2020;Kang et al, 2020;Kluge et al, 2020;Lima et al, 2020;Roy et al, 2020;Spoorthy, 2020;Wenham et al, 2020) but studies are limited on the transgender/hijra population. The present study gauges knowledge about COVID19, food insecurity, access to healthcare services, and psychological reactions of transgender/hijra population in Gujarat during COVID-19.…”