Close-to-community providers, gender and COVID-19 webinar

Close-to-community health care providers, such as community health workers, play a vital role in supporting their local health systems. Their roles can be particularly crucial in fragile and shock-prone settings and during times of crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

This webinar – Close-to-community providers in fragile settings and vulnerable communities during crisis: Gender and COVID-19 – heard how gender, COVID-19 and fragility interplayed in the work and lives of health care providers in Brazil, Lebanon, Sierra Leone and Nepal. The presentations also took overview of the global situation for these vital workers.

A recording of the webinar (closed captions are available)

The ReBUILD parts of the webinar – presentations from Abriti Arjyal of HERD International and Rouham Yamout of AUB – were based on their teams’ work for the research project, the gendered experience of close-to-community providers in fragile and shock-prone settings: implications for policy and practice during and post COVID-19. More on that work here.

This webinar was presented in collaboration with the Thematic Working Group on Fragile and Conflict-Affected Settings.

Running order

  • What do we know about gender, health workers and COVID-19 from the global literature?Rosemary Morgan, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, USA
  • The COVID-19 pandemic and public health professionals in Brazil – Brunah Schall, René Rachou Research Institute, Fiocruz Minas, Brazil
  • Crises in Lebanon: The role of close-to-community providers during COVID-19Rouham Yamout, American University of Beirut, Lebanon
  • Close-to-community providers, gender and COVID-19 in NepalAbriti Arjyal, HERD International, Nepal
  • Feminist plan for sustainability and social justice post COVID-19Silke Staab, UN Women