Impacto de la pandemia de COVID-19 en las vidas y derechos de las académicas y científicas ecuatorianas

Since the beginning of the quarantine, in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, concerns arose from the area of social research about the impact of the health crisis on the personal and professional lives of women academics and scientists around the world. The gender gap in the sciences evidently existed from before the pandemic, and the health crisis brought with it fears of a reversal in the gains made in terms of gender equity in academia. As a result, research is being conducted around the world in order to understand and assess the present and future impact of the crisis. This research project explores that impact in relation to the lives and rights of Ecuadorian women academics and scientists.

The project was developed in collaboration with the Ecuadorian Network of Women Scientists (REMCI), with whose members we discussed the work from the planning stage. Thus, we mainly explored the difficulties experienced by female academics throughout the country during the confinement from March to September 2020, as well as their personal and professional criteria in relation to the management of the crisis. The findings constitute important inputs for the design of institutional and state policies in the short and long term. According to the literature and existing projections, the pandemic will have prolonged effects on the academic production and professional careers of women scientists. This report explains several critical nodes that we must continue to observe in order to mitigate these effects, while suggesting some measures to be implemented.