OIC Women’s Advisory Council holds Virtual meeting to Discuss the Impact of Coronavirus on Women in Member States

Date: 11/06/2020

The General Secretariat of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) hosted on 11 June 2020 a virtual meeting of its Women’s Advisory Council. The meeting was held under the theme “Women in the OIC Member States and the coronavirus pandemic”.

Presided over by Burkina Faso’s Minister of Women, National Solidarity, Family and Humanitarian Action, Mrs Hélène Marie Laurence Ilboudou/Marchal, the meeting addressed the novel coronavirus pandemic’s impact on women and girls in the member States. The objective was to formulate recommendations and propose policies and strategies to the Ministerial Conference on Women, to the Member States and to specialized OIC organs and institutions, to integrate gender perspectives in their response to COVID-19 and its consequences on women and girls.

Speaking on behalf of the OIC General Secretariat, the Assistant Secretary General for Cultural, Social and Humanitarian Affairs, Amb. Tareq Bakheit, underlined that the pandemic has put the entire humanity to the test, pointing out that women, though less affected in number by the COVID-19 outbreak, bear the brunt associated with the crisis and the restrictive measures imposed by states to stem its spread.

What makes the situation worse, he pointed out, is that the OIC Member States, most notably the least developed ones, have fragile public health systems, where populations are already facing countless threats to their health and livelihoods. It is therefore paramount, he stressed, that the international community help the least developed countries (LDCs) to cope with the consequences and negative effects of the pandemic.

For her part, Mrs Marchal warned that the spread of the virus may worsen the situation of women, explaining that the pandemic had varying effects on the livelihoods of both men and women. She stressed that, the coronavirus has exacerbated inequalities for women, made violence in homes more frequent and led to higher levels of poverty within female communities across the OIC countries.

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