The impact of COVID‐19 pandemic on gender‐related work from home in STEM fields—Report of the WiMPBME Task Group

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many people, including those in the fields of science and engineering, to work from home. The new working environment caused by the pandemic is assumed to have a different impact on the amount of work that women and men can do from home.Particularly, if the major burden of child and other types of care is still predominantly on the shoulders of women. As such, a survey was conducted to assess the main issues that biomedical engineers, medical physicists (academics and professionals), and other similar professionals have been facing when working from home during the pandemic. A survey was created and disseminated worldwide. It originated from a committee of International Union for Physical and Engineering Sciences in Medicine (IUPESM; Women in

The Biggest Challenges Resulting from the COVID-19 Pandemic on Gender-Related Work from Home in Biomedical Fields—World-Wide Qualitative Survey Analysis

“…From 921 responders to the initial survey [ 9 ], 646 responded to the question, “What has been most challenging during the lockdown for you, and/or family?”. As reported in Table 1 , these participants included 403 (62%) females, were primarily in the age group of 30–44 years (56%), primarily Caucasian (49.8%), and most participants reported having access to a home office (69.7%).…”

“…This evaluation focuses on responses to one open-ended question from a larger survey evaluating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on gender-related work from home in STEM fields [ 9 ]. The question asked and analysed for this study was “What has been most challenging during the lockdown for you, and/or your family?” Participant data was collected from self-selecting volunteers using the SurveyMonkey platform, disseminated worldwide through professional and personal email contacts among members of the WiMPBME task group.…”

“…It was also promoted through web postings and social media of organisations involved. Specific methodology related to data collection, ethics approvals, and relevant processes has been described elsewhere [ 9 ]. The raw data was exported from SurveyMonkey to Microsoft Excel 2016 and subsequently imported into NVivo version 1.0 (2020) for analysis.…”

“…Given the above, the Women in Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering (WiMPBME) task group of the International Union for Physical and Engineering Sciences in Medicine (IUPESM) has designed and conducted a survey on gender-related work from home under the umbrella of the three main international organisations of our professions: (1) IUPESM, (2) the International Federation of Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE), and (3) the International Organization for Medical Physics (IOMP). The quantitative data originating from the survey has been interpreted and published [ 9 ].…”

Women deserve better: A discussion on COVID‐19 and the gendered organization in the new economy

“…Ultimately, the pandemics "she-cession" is underscored by a historical legacy of policymakers unwilling (or unable) to pass legislation and/or policies that support gender equality in the organization and society at large. While men have benefitted from science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields and women have been burdened with care/household responsibilities during the pandemic (Frize et al, 2021), how could the distribution of both capital and labor income between men and women return to pre-pandemic levels and better post-pandemic? Beyond the smokescreen of performative allyship across industries and occupations during the pandemic, persisting gendered practices are evidence for diversity and gender policies to adopt a new approach toward gender parity (Bourabain, 2021).…”