Gender and health at the time of Covid-19

Abstract

The author reflects, within the critical perspective of medical anthropology, on the current relevance of the gender category in the analysis of public health phenomena and crisis related to a pandemic such as the Covid-19 one, with particular reference to the condition of women. Trough a wide look on the concept of disease from a social, cultural and historical point of view a number of relevant gender implications of Covid-19 are highlighted in terms not only of health, but also of education, economic conditions and more generally women’s agency. The usefulness of the anthropological notion of “sindemic” is also reiterated.