Coronavirus or COVID-19 is an infectious disease that accelerates all over the world. The impact of the virus is too high in India as well. Being the second most populated country in the world and fewer medical facilities, the impact of COVID would be unimaginable if it spread across the country. Understanding this and as there is no medicine yet found, the Indian Government announced a complete lockdown on March 24th. As the impact of the virus was not reduced, the lockdown is still extending. On the other side, India is the country where a huge population is dependent on their daily wages. The lockdown creates a huge impact and shakes their lives. When it comes to COVID 19 News, there are lots to state and one important area is the impact on the women workforce.
Impact on the women employees
One section of the Indian population that is painfully, but sadly and not surprisingly absent from the discussion of the negative consequences is the women. While gender has been absent from the official lens, but recently some pieces of information showed some spotlight on the impact of the pandemic management measures of the women. It was so shocking that domestic and intimate partner violence has been noted in several counties including the US, UK, and china.
While all vulnerable populations suffer in several ways, the gender lens is warranted as a woman. Particularly the sufferers are the women in the lowest rank in the hierarchy of caste, class, or religion stratification. There is also greater inequality in labor force participation, the burden of care, wages, sharing of household work, and the sharing of resources, etc. could be substantially altered due to the crisis.
Work burden for women
Generally, Indian women have to care for the entire home and the people in it despite being employed or unemployed. This lockdown period has added more to it. Now, all the members of the family are in the home. So, women need to work continuously to take care of the children, clean the home, cook, etc. In India, the middle-class families are more dependent on several workers like maids, drivers, gardeners, garbage collectors, dhobi, small vendors, who will bring all the essential things to home, delivery partners, etc.
With this complete lockdown, all these works are on the head of the women of the family. So, women in every family have a huge work burden. Adding to it, some women also asked to take work from home in several IT companies and they need to do all these and complete the office work as well.
Malnourished women domestic workers
The percentage of malnourished women especially those who are suffering from issues like anemia are experiencing poor health in this duration. Data also confirms that 70% of non-pregnant women and 75% of pregnant women between 15 and 49 are anemic and it has adverse effects beyond maternal mortality. This might cause some intrauterine growth retardation, child nutrition, and the prevalence of chronic diseases. The domestic workers are highly impacted economically and they might need more care to make them healthy.
Daily lives of the domestic workers
As the employees have withheld work and salaries during this lockdown period, the domestic and migrant workers are suffering more and even survival has become a huge challenge now. They all need to walk in the sun for kilometers to reach the native along with the infants and children. Every state in India is experiencing some difficulties with this. When it comes to women, it is hard for them to manage the family situation, care for their health, the health of the family, and their homes.
What can be the solution to the pain of the women? When you really need to care for women, everyone has to change the way of thinking. When everyone needs food to eat, anyone can cook. Similarly, everyone lives in the home and so anyone can clean it. You can also look for some ways to help the women in your society for promoting their wellness. Further, follow ETV Bharat Headlines to know more about the Covid-19 news and its effects.
