gender equality

President Trump boarding Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Md. July 10, 2020, en route to Miami. The administration notified the UN on July 6 that the US was withdrawing from the World Health Organization, effective exactly one year later. TIA DUFOUR/WHITE HOUSE
In a final straw to the current troubles between the World Health Organization and the United States, the Trump administration notified United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres on July 6 of its withdrawal from the agency, effective July 6, 2021.

A view of Panama City from the apartment of the author, a former vice president and foreign minister of Panama. The country is slowly reopening after months of lockdown, although the number of confirmed Covid-19 cases keeps rising. ISABEL SAINT MALO

The Women’s March, 2017, above. A new campaign led by women in the United States with global experience are advocating that a feminist foreign policy be instituted in all branches of the federal government, regardless of national politics. JOHN JACK/CREATIVE COMMONS

Latin American women have always suffered from an epidemic of violence, but Covid-19 has brought hope that new protections could help stem that tide. Women performing “A Rapist in Your Path,” in Mexico City, a feminist anthem that originated in Chile. CREATIVE COMMONS

The head of the UN Environment Program, Inger Andersen, at the agency’s Champions of the Earth Awards, Sept. 26, 2019, in Cipriani, New York City. With the pandemic now upending agendas, Andersen hopes something positive will emerge eventually, such as “keeping wildlife wild,” she said. UNEP

In Bamako, a signing ceremony of an agreement between the UN and Mali through its Ministry of Health and Social Affairs, to strengthen the response to Covid-19 with approximately $2.6 million, April 6, 2020. HARANDANE DICKO/MINUSMA

Reports of domestic violence are rising as Covid-19 races across the planet and people are ordered to stay home. But as UN Secretary-General Guterres said on April 5: “For many women and girls, the threat looms largest where they should be safest. In their homes.” Like many countries, Spain, above, is in lockdown mode. JOHN PENNEY

UN Women’s executive director, Phumzile Mlambo-Ncguka, speaking at the Commission on the Status of Women’s annual meeting in March 2020, at UN headquarters. The conference had been cut to a single day from 11, as the Covid-19 virus began racing from China to the rest of the world. Now, the Generation Equality Forum is postponed until 2021. RYAN BROWN/UN WOMEN
UN Women is postponing two long-planned international meetings designed to give civil society groups a leading role in advancing gender rights 25 years after a landmark 1995 Beijing conference on women.

Certain factors contributing to gender imbalances in some populations have resulted in “missing girls,” like in Vietnam, above, and “disappearing men,” like in Russia. The Covid-19 pandemic will have enduring effects on the imbalances as well.
Normally, the numbers of males and females in a human population are about the same across all such populations. However, pregnancy interventions by couples and unhealthy lifestyles among young men have produced gender imbalances, giving rise to “missing girls” in some populations and “disappearing men” in others.

UN headquarters in New York, during the opening of the General Assembly’s annual debate, above, September 2019. The Generation Equality Forum scheduled for May in Mexico City, to mark the 25th anniversary of the Beijing conference on women’s rights, is likely to be postponed or cancelled. AMANDA VOISARD/UN PHOTO
Another highlight of the year marking the 25th anniversary of a breakthrough international conference in Beijing on women’s rights has fallen victim to the global march of the new coronavirus, Covid-19.