Photo credit: Kate Holt/Jhpiego

The COVID-19 pandemic not only threatens the health and incomes of families, communities and countries, it also increases the risk of violence against women and other vulnerable groups. Jhpiego’s focus during the pandemic is ensuring continuation of essential health services, including those that seek to protect women and families and that respond to survivors of gender-based violence (GBV).

In Mozambique, Jhpiego is supporting the Ministry of Health to develop recommendations and activities to mitigate GBV during the pandemic. We’re training health workers to look for signs of GBV when screening clients for COVID-19 and to respond to and follow up with GBV survivors using the World Health Organization’s “Listen, Inquire, Validate, Enhance Safety and Support” approach. Together with the government and partners, our team engaged men through social media to enlist them as agents of change to prevent GBV, and produced videos to raise awareness of GBV during the pandemic.

In Nepal, where data from government hotlines show an increase in GBV, we’re coordinating with the government, health facilities and local police to safeguard women and families. We’ve pivoted from in-person to virtual trainings of health care providers at health facilities with one-stop crisis management centers to screen for and respond to GBV. Online mentoring sessions support health workers at remote facilities as they care for GBV survivors, and tools we’ve developed with the United Nations Population Fund will allow health workers to assess the readiness of health facilities to provide such services to GBV survivors.

In the Philippines, Jhpiego set up hotlines for reporting emergencies and getting on-the-spot GBV counseling, and we’re working with local organizations to make emergency help available in villages. Our teams are ready to implement Jhpiego’s Gender Transformation for Health training at six sites once the lockdown ends. And in Pakistan, we supported the Ministry of Health to develop facility and home quarantine guidelines and strengthen its response to COVID-19, which includes vital gender considerations and ways to mitigate and respond to GBV.

From Afghanistan to Tanzania, Jhpiego has worked to integrate gender-sensitive programming into our projects since 2015. Our tools and strategies for ensuring compassionate, person-centered care have helped mitigate GBV, promote gender equity in the health workforce, engage men in care and support couple’s communication to promote healthy, nonviolent behaviors. We may not have anticipated a pandemic, but our partners and colleagues are at the ready.