With 78th World Health Assembly of the UN health agency,
the World Health Organization (WHO) being held later in May
2025, The Lancet Commission on Gender and Global Health has
launched an important multi-disciplinary report that shows
how gender and health nexus can be better understood and
addressed to serve equity and social justice goals.
Dr
Ravi Verma who is one of the Commissioners of The Lancet
Commission on Gender and Global Health and Executive
Director, International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW),
Asia, said that “To understand why gender presents such
challenges for the global health sector The Lancet
Commission reviewed massive amount of literature – social,
political, legal and economic literature to find and assess
how some of these forces are at work in the gender domain
and how intertwined are the issues of capitalism,
imperialism and capitalism in their effects on people’s
health and well-being. We see this humanitarian crisis
emerging out of all this history of colonisation,
imperialism and capitalism which has been brought out so
lucidly.” He was speaking in SHE & Rights (Sexual
Health with Equity & Rights) session which is hosted by
Global Center for Health Diplomacy and Inclusion (CeHDI) and
CNS with IPPF, ARROW, APCAT Media and
WGNRR.
“Bringing gender justice in health policies
and programmes and practices is important. The report has
highlighted how in various countries if programmes have
promoted gender equality, they have had much better and
wider positive outcomes than just about dealing with the
illnesses,” said Dr Verma.
Ground realities of
gender diverse peoples in Afghanistan
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Parwen Hussaini
of Afghanistan is at risk of her life along with her lesbian
lover Maryam (Maryam is under arrest). Parwen serves as a
Programme Associate at Roshaniya, a LGBTQI+ rights group in
Afghanistan.
Parwen was born in Gazhni province of
Afghanistan and identifies as a lesbian and Afghan. She
narrowly escaped persecution and arrest by the Taliban on
20th March 2025 and she is now in Iran. “I have endured
hardships my whole life until this point. Since the current
Taliban regime has come to power, we basically had no
options, we have no hope; there is nothing to live for
gender diverse people. The situation for Afghan women is
deplorable. They cannot leave their house for work or for
any other reason,” said Parwen. “We had no rights, we
were criminalized then and we are criminalized now. The only
difference is that back then there was some space and some
room for us.”
Parwen and her lover were engaged to
get married when they tried to escape. Her lover (Maryam) is
being tortured and imprisoned by the Taliban and in prison
for over one and a half months (as on 10 May
2025).
They are devastated since that day on 20th
March 2025 when Parwen, Maryam and Maeve (a transgender
person) tried to come to Iran. But on that day, everything
backfired because the Taliban apprehended and detained
Maryam and Maeve and they have been in captivity since then.
Luckily Parwen was able to get through the airport security.
Parwen was lucky that her brother agreed to sign off as a
male chaperone to give permission so that she can reach the
airport and get on board. But Mariam was not able to get a
male relative chaperone because her family refused, and got
arrested.
After several failed attempts, she
eventually got support from “Roshaniya” group, which
reached out to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, UN
special Rapporteur in Afghanistan and others but no relief
came through. However, Peter Tatchel Foundation UK stepped
forward to support them.
Right now, Parwen faces an
uncertain future in Iran because if her visa expires, they
will deport her back to Afghanistan and if that happens, she
will be imprisoned and tortured and possibly face a death
penalty.
Gender justice is a fundamental human
right and it is critical to advance progress towards all
sustainable development goals.
Nemat Sadat,
CEO of “Roshaniya” (an advocacy network dedicated to
assisting LGBTQI+ Afghans) and one of the first Afghans to
have openly come out as gay and to campaign for LGBTQI+
rights, gender freedom and liberty, said: “We have a list
of over 1,000 LGBTQI+ peoples who still remain in
Afghanistan. To this date, we have supported the safe
evacuation of 265 people to different countries and we hope
that Parwen will also get to a safe place. Right now, her
future looks very uncertain because it is very difficult for
someone to leave Iran to go to another country as Iran is
under sanctions. There are 7 million Afghans in Iran and
many of them are trying to secure humanitarian visa to go to
a western country. So, it could take years and Parwen does
not have that kind of a time frame.”
South Sudan
conflict and women and other marginalised
persons
“The ongoing conflict in South Sudan has
disempowered a lot of excluded and marginalised peoples
including women, LGBTQI+, people living with HIV, persons
with disabilities, sex workers, among others. So, when it
comes to gender justice the issue of gender-based violence
becomes central. There is physical violence, domestic
violence, and sexual harassment and sexual abuse. They are
raping women rampantly. Due to the conflict there is also
increased risk for the displacement of women and girls in
South Sudan (which puts them at greater risk of violence).
There is also limited access to justice and support for
young women, women with disability, and people with HIV
because of their condition,” said Rachel Adau, Executive
Director of the Women’s Empowerment Centre South
Sudan.
“Our healthcare system is breaking down and
affecting reproductive health of young women and girls. The
maternal and child healthcare is at its worse because the
health facility itself has no services to offer. We advocate
for pregnant women to go to the hospital to deliver, but the
health facilities have no gloves, no beds, no midwives, and
other essential supplies. So, they cannot deliver their
child safely. This discourages women from going to the
health facilities, which again is very risky for their
lives,” added Rachel.
Lebanon, women, gender
diverse and other marginalised persons
“Since the
Gaza war, 4000 people in Lebanon have been killed and 1.3
million have been displaced mainly from the areas that were
affected by the war – that is South Lebanon. The war has
caused an estimated US$ 11 billion in damage and 9% decline
in the Lebanon’s GDP. Hospitals and healthcare facilities
were bombed, and the local organisations played the main
role in providing shelter, food, medical and even mental
health support. However, it is the vulnerable and
marginalized groups – mainly the LGBTQI+ individuals,
refugees, people living with HIV, people with disabilities,
elderly and others that are paying the price more than
anyone else in society,” said Bertho Makso, Regional
Community Engagement & Networks Lead at the
International Planned Parenthood Federation at its Arab
World Regional Office.
Across the Global South we face
a lot of humanitarian crises: Why?
“Across the
Global South, we continue to face a lot of humanitarian
crises. We face floods, hunger, war, conflicts, and women
and girls continue to be the most affected, the most at
risk, and more importantly the LGBTQI+ community are most at
risk and most affected. When we think about all the
inequities then it is them that suffer the most. We see
alarming gender-based violence, disrupted access to
essential services like education and health care, and we
also have heightened risk of women and girls facing sexual
exploitation, early marriage and displacement,” said Nelly
Munyasia, Executive Director, Reproductive Health Network of
Kenya.
Kenya’s Constitutional Promise on gender
equality threatened by regressive GCD
“Kenya has
not only signed the regressive Geneva Consensus Declaration,
but this month Kenya would be hosting the so-called
‘family values conference’. This is more problematic
because this creates an environment for the anti-rights
movement to penetrate deeper into policy spaces in Kenya. We
continue to call out collectively and speak against this
regressive group of individuals who purport to be ensuring
that they are restoring African ‘values’, but what they
are trying to preach is not African when they talk about
killing of the LGBTQI+ community and when they spread
hatred,” said Nelly Munyasia.
“Kenya as a country
does recognize the intersex persons. We are focusing on
ensuring that we implement the constitution, we hold the
government accountable and support the government too, to
deal with the anti-rights groups that are well funded and
well-coordinated. But we are not going to be gagged, we are
not going to stop, and we are going to ensure that everyone
enjoys their rights not only in Kenya but Africa as a
whole.”
Gender inequality is in itself a perpetual
humanitarian crisis which girls and women and gender diverse
peoples have been facing on an ongoing daily basis
historically
“Perhaps there may not be a single girl
or woman or gender diverse person on this planet who can say
that he or she or they have never ever faced any type of
violence or abuse or threat. The threat and danger of sexual
and other forms of gender-based violence haunts so many of
us every moment – sometimes even inside our homes. Wars and
conflicts, extreme climate events, religious bigotry, or
other forms of humanitarian crises exacerbate gender
inequality and violations of human rights manifold,” said
Shobha Shukla, Coordinator, SHE & Rights (Sexual Health
with Equity & Rights) initiative and Executive Director,
CNS.
To quote The Lancet Commission on Gender and
Global Health report, “We are in ‘the fight of our
lives’ against the anti-gender rhetoric and a rollback of
gender rights. Now is a crucial moment in time to turn the
tide on the rise of anti-gender rhetoric and to increase
understanding of the importance of gender in public
health”.
“Arriving at gender justice in global
health is not a technical exercise- this is an exercise in
understanding people’s lives, their history, the politics,
the economy, their culture and their local relations and
context. This means we must identify those spaces where
power and privileges are exercised inequitably and find some
ways to disrupt that. The report calls for disrupting those
spaces where the power dynamics are being played out and
people are taking that for granted. That means it requires a
lot of tactics and strategies at multiple levels,” said Dr
Ravi Verma, one of the Commissioners (and authors) of The
Lancet Commission report.
Let us work together and
support each other for a feminist and gender just inclusive
world order where everyone has equal rights, equal dignity
and equal access and control of resources, irrespective of
their caste, creed or gender identity. Gender inequality and
toxic masculinity must end with us.
Shobha Shukla,
Coordinator, SHE & Rights (Sexual Health with Equity
& Rights) Initiative| Email: editor@citizen-news.org
