Gender, health systems resilience and equity – podcast
‘Stories of Resilience – Local Lives and Health Systems’ is a podcast series from ReBUILD for Resilience. Each episode examines a different resilience-related topic, with a particular focus on fragile and shock-prone settings.
In this second episode – ‘Gender, health systems resilience and equity‘ – we explore the intersection of gender and health systems in fragile settings. Co-hosted by Abriti Arjyal from HERD International, the episode features insights from Dr Rouham Yamout from American University of Beirut and Dr Val Percival [opens new tab] from Carleton University. The discussion covers the impact of gender dynamics on health systems during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic and armed conflicts, emphasising community-led, participatory approaches to promote gender equality and resilience in health systems.
The transcript of this podcast can be read here.
The speakers
The series is produced by The SCL Agency [opens new tab] with Dr Kim Ozano hosting each instalment. In this episode Kim chatted with:
Abriti Arjyal – HERD International
Abriti leads HERD International’s qualitative and participatory approaches in ReBUILD for Resilience. She has a focus on gender and intersectionality and experience in public health, health systems, service delivery research, social science, and gender and equity. She has led formative and operational field studies, evaluation studies, and literature reviews, developing expertise in design, implementation and analysis of qualitative research, rapid ethnography and various community and participatory-based approaches. Most of Abriti’s work has focused on gender and resilience, including maternal and child health, antibiotic resistance, disaster risk reduction, resilience, nutrition, diabetes and violence against women.
Dr Rouham Yamout – American University of Beirut
Rouham was a medical doctor for 20 years before moving into public health where she now focuses on health system research and strengthening access to quality healthcare. She has extensive research experience with projects involving internally displaced people’s mental health, the ethics of research in war time, and waterpipe smoking among adolescents. Rouham has worked for International Red Cross where she was a trainer in the clinical management of rape and sexual assault, Lebanese University as an instructor in research design for nursing students, and in UN organisations looking at immunisation, nutrition and refugee health.
Dr Valerie Percival – Norman Paterson School of International Affairs [opens new tab], Carleton University
Val’s research focuses on the impact of violent conflict on the health of civilians, the backlash against gender equality, as well as gender norms and health care delivery. She is a Commissioner for The Lancet Commission on Peaceful Societies through Health and Gender Equality and led the research and writing of the Commission report (watch Val speak on the Commission here). In partnership with the Aga Khan Foundation of Canada, she is the Principal Investigator for GenLab, a Community of Practice in Mozambique that works to understand how gender norms influence access to and delivery of healthcare services. She has worked with the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, the International Crisis Group directing their Kosovo office, the UNHCR, and PRIO.
The Stories of Resilience podcast series
- Episode 1: Revisiting resilience in health systems research
- Episode 2: Gender, health systems resilience and equity
- Episode 3: The Health Workforce in Times of Crisis
More episodes will follow soon.
Further information
The health worker studies referenced by Abriti and Rouham are:
- The gendered experience of close-to-community providers in fragile and shock-prone (FASP) settings: implications for policy and practice during and post COVID-19
- Close-to-community providers addressing gender norms and power dynamics: participatory action research in fragile and shock-prone settings