Positive outcomes of COVID-19 research-related gender policy changes

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed and exacerbated gender biases in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine. Accumulating evidence suggests that female scientists’ productivity dropped during the initial lockdown period. With more time being spent on caregiving responsibilities, women may be struggling to collaborate on grant applications and launch new experiments. Scientists with disabilities or who belong to Indigenous nations or communities of color may have less time to devote to research due to health, family, or community needs. Collateral damage in this situation, the appropriate integration of sex, gender, and other identity characteristics in research content may also suffer. Sex and gender are better attended to when female scientists form part of the research team. Research funding agencies have a role to play in mitigating these effects by putting in place gender equity policies that support all applicants and ensure research quality. Accordingly, a national health research funder implemented gender policy changes that included extending deadlines and factoring sex and gender into COVID-19 grant requirements. Following these changes, the funder received more applications from female scientists, awarded a greater proportion of grants to female compared to male scientists, and received and funded more grant applications that considered sex and gender in the content of COVID-19 research. Whether or not these strategies will be sufficient in the long-term to prevent widening of the gender gap in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine requires continued monitoring and oversight. Further work is urgently required to mitigate inequities associated with identity characteristics beyond gender.