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UN Women | The Shadow Pandemic: Violence against women during COVID-19

UN Women | The Shadow Pandemic: Violence against women during COVID-19

One in three women worldwide experience physical or sexual violence mostly by an intimate partner. Violence against women and girls is a human rights violation. Since the outbreak of COVID-19, emerging data and reports from those on the front lines, have shown that all types of violence against women and girls, particularly domestic violence, has intensified. This is the Shadow Pandemic growing amidst the COVID-19 crisis and we need a global collective effort to stop it. As COVID-19 cases continue to strain health services, essential services, such as domestic violence shelters and helplines, have reached capacity. More needs to be done to prioritize addressing violence against women in COVID-19 response and recovery efforts. Everyone has a role to play.

**UN Women is providing up-to-date information and supporting vital programmes to fight the Shadow Pandemic of violence against women during COVID-19.

The Wilson Center | Visualizing the Scope and Scale of Femicide in Latin America

The Wilson Center | Visualizing the Scope and Scale of Femicide in Latin America

Even before the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic, the home was a place of fear for many women and girls living in situations of violence. In Latin America, 70 percent of femicides occur in the victim’s home.

The quarantine and stay-at-home orders that governments adopted to address COVID-19 trapped many women with their abusers; evidence from early on in the pandemic reinforces the urgency of this issue. ORMUSA, or Organización de Mujeres Salvadoreña, in El Salvador reported 13 femicides in the first 6 weeks of quarantine between March 17 and April 29, 2020. In Argentina, 63 women and girls were killed because of their gender between March 20 and July 7. In the month of March 2020, 50 feminicides were recorded in just six states in Brazil. These statistics are alarming as the virus continues to spread across the Americas, raising fears that extended lockdowns will continue to exacerbate gender-based violence while governments struggle to address the twin public health crises.

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