“The pandemic has shown us in the starkest terms how wide the gaps are in health outcomes between Black and White America and between men and women,” said Representative Alma Adams (D-NC-12) at a recent Wilson Center event on women, race, and COVID-19 in the United States. “COVID-19 has revealed what the Black community and communities of color have known for a long time, health outcomes are further compounded by systemic and structural racism,” said Rep. Alma Adams. And COVID-19 has exposed what women have known for a long time. Gender inequality exists, it threatens economic empowerment, and it increases vulnerabilities.

“Our world is grappling with the COVID-19 pandemic and also coming to terms with systematic racism and oppression that black communities and communities of color continue to experience in the United States and in other parts of the world,” said Sarah Craven, Director of the Washington, D.C. office at the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) at a recent webinar launching UNFPA’s 2020 State of the World’s Population Report. This year’s report, titled Against My Will, covers three widespread practices that violate human rights, but are still accepted in many cultures—son preference, child marriage, and female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C).

In just a single year, a 10 percent decrease in sexual and reproductive health services in low- and middle-income countries could lead to another 49 million women with unmet need for contraception, according to Guttmacher Institute estimates from April 2020. Other possible effects include another 15 million unintended pregnancies, another 28,000 maternal deaths and 168,000 newborn deaths due to untreated complications, and another 3 million unsafe abortions and 1,000 maternal deaths due to unsafe abortions. The implications are staggering in terms of unmet needs, unintended pregnancies, unsafe abortions, and maternal and newborn deaths in 132 countries that are home to more than 1.6 billion women of reproductive age (15–49 years).

COVID-19 is having a profound impact on Latin American women. Gender-based violence increased drastically after governments imposed lockdowns, leaving policymakers and law enforcement scrambling to prevent attacks. Latin America was already one of the most dangerous regions for women, with the highest rate of sexual violence and some of the highest femicide numbers in the world. The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean registered 3,529 femicides in 2018, or one woman killed every two hours due to her gender. For many women living through the coronavirus pandemic in Latin America, the greater health risk might be staying home.