Pandemic Triggers Crisis for Women with Childcare and Endangers their Career Achievements

Without support networks and equal division of household chores, mothers lose autonomy and work

São Paulo



One year after the start of the pandemic and social isolation in Brazil, women who have children appear to be on edge. Overworked, exhausted, and frustrated, they have lost their autonomy, their job,s their sleep, or their sanity — all together or in varying combinations.

SAO PAULO -SP - 03/02/2021 - Vailma Santos and Heloisa (5). Without support networks and equal division of household chores, mothers lose autonomy and work. FOTO MARLENE BERGAMO/Folhapress. 017 - SELENE 588036 - Marlene Bargamo


By closing daycare centers and schools and isolating people, the global health crisis has crippled the support networks (solidarity, public, or contraction) that allowed these women to have a relatively independent, productive life, threatening to reverse women's achievements in decades.

It is not surprising, therefore, that women have been more affected by the global crisis, to the point of inspiring the creation of the English expression “shecession”, an inflection of “she” and “recession.”

Women have been impacted by the pandemic physically (with the increase in domestic violence) and mentally (they presented mental disorders) and financially. They suffered higher unemployment and have been neglected in rehiring.

Translated by Kiratiana Freelon

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