As research and the current global pandemic is showing, gender equity is important for global health including the digital health sector. While there are disproportionately more female public health practitioners and frontline health workers, we see stark imbalances in global health as well as digital health leadership and representation in software development roles in digital health as well as in data and research. The result is gender inequity in our digital health ecosystem that hinders the full transformative power that digital technology can have on health. This is not a women’s issue, it is an issue that impacts everyone working in digital health and our collective efforts.
In this two-hour deep dive session hosted by the Global Digital Health Network, members of the Digital Health and Interoperability Gender Working Group facilitated an interactive, informative, and inspiring 2-hour session placing the spotlight on gender in digital and data. Participants walked away with an understanding of why gender is important for digital health including how we collect data. Participants gained an understanding of the benefits in bringing a gender lens to digital health work and learned how to apply gender tools to our digital and data activities.
The agenda covered:
- Priorities and activities of the DH&I Gender Working Group
- Gender Terminology – why this matters
- Discussion – Your observations/experiences with gender sensitive programming
- Activity – case studies: Leadership, Developers, Frontline HealthWorkers, Data and Research
- Discussion – The dangers of being gender blind
- Taking action and making gender equity commitments
Note: Please skip from 1:01:40 to 1:25:52 as this was the time participants were in breakout rooms.