New Delhi: The World Health Organization (WHO), in a report, has highlighted how gender disparities in health and care work adversely affect women, health systems, and outcomes.
Titled ‘Fair share for health and care: gender and the undervaluation of health and care work,’ the report said that women constitute a significant portion of the global health and care workforce, yet they also perform the majority of unpaid care activities. This imbalance results in lower wages and poor working conditions for women.
“Women comprise 67% of the paid global health and care workforce. In addition to this paid work, it has been estimated that women perform an estimated 76% of all unpaid care activities. Work that is done primarily by women tends to be paid less and have poor working conditions,” the report said.
The report highlights that low pay and demanding working conditions are commonly found in the health and care sector. Devaluing caregiving, which is work performed primarily by women, negatively impacts wages, working conditions, productivity and the economic footprint of the sector, it added.
Chronic underinvestment in health and care exacerbates this issue, leading to a global crisis of care.
“With stagnation in progress towards universal health coverage, resulting in 4.5 billion people lacking full coverage of essential health services, women may take on even more unpaid care work. The deleterious impact of weak health systems combined with increasing unpaid health and care work are further straining the health of caregivers and the quality of services,” it said.
“The ‘Fair share’ report highlights how gender-equitable investments in health and care work would reset the value of health and care and drive fairer and more inclusive economies,” said Jim Campbell, WHO director for Health Workforce. “We are calling upon leaders, policymakers and employers to action investment: it is time for a fair share for health and care.”
The report calls for gender-equitable investments and policy measures to value and support health and care work, stressing the importance of recognising and investing in robust public health systems.
