Closing the leadership gap

By Niamh MacKey

Women make up the majority of the frontline workforce responding to COVID-19 but are underrepresented in leadership roles. Women lead just 18 percent of the government taskforces that guide national COVID-19 pandemic responses.

As COVID-19 pandemic threatens to widen the leadership gap for women in health and social care, the World Health Organization, Global Health Workforce Network and Women in Global Health have released Closing the leadership gap: gender equity and leadership in the global health and care workforce.

The report highlights four points of action to support women’s leadership including:

• Building a legal foundation for equality in the workplace;

• Addressing social norms and stereotypes;

• Addressing workplace systems and culture; and

• Enabling women, who are the majority in the health and social care workforce to lead.

The report calls for leaders in health to make sincere commitments to leadership equality which include recognising how intersectionality informs women’s experiences in the workplace. It calls for solidarity among women and accountability from male allies.

This report follows the 2019 WHO report Delivered by women, led by men: a gender and equity analysis of the global health and social workforce.

For more information read Closing the leadership gap and Delivered by women, led by men.