Every year, on the 8th of March, the world celebrates the social, cultural, political and economic achievements of women, simultaneously calling for equality in all aspects of life, including parity and gender transformative leadership for women all over the world.

At UNITE, we count with the active leadership of women parliamentarians, who not only coordinate the activities of our network, but are active leaders in their national parliaments when it comes to health matters.

During her time in the parliament of Kenya, Hon. Dennitah Ghati, UNITE member since 2022, has been a champion for sexual and reproductive health and rights. She supported a motion on fistula, urging the government to invest heavily on specialized training for fistula surgeons and subsidize the cost of fistula surgery in Kenya, where many women are heavily impacted by the condition. Additionally, Hon. Ghati supported two bills on reproductive health and assisted reproductive technology, with the goal of, among many others, regulating IVF and making sure overpricing is controlled. She also supported a bill on mental health, seeking to ensure that national and county health budgets address mental health, as well as a cancer prevention and control amendment bill, ensuring the use of telemedicine to reach more cancer patients in rural areas. Across different fields, Hon. Ghati has been ensuring that gender approaches are included in all policies.

 

The article 43 of the Constitution of Kenya establishes the right to the highest attainable standards of health for all citizens; however, the reproductive health budget is far smaller when compared to other issues.

– Hon. Dennitah Ghati, Kenya

In Argentina, Hon. Gisela Scaglia, a UNITE member since 2018, led advocacy on infectious diseases, especially tuberculosis, HIV and viral hepatitis, making sure it was part of the parliament’s agenda. According to Hon. Scaglia, it is fundamental to understand that infectious diseases, especially tuberculosis, are still a reality that impacts the health and lives of millions, especially those living in poverty or part of vulnerable groups. Here, women are disproportionally affected, and any health policies must incorporate a gender perspective. At the same time, Hon. Gisela Scaglia was a key leader in nutrition matters at the congress, working on the Front-of-Package Labelling Law, as a way of raising awareness for healthy lifestyles and nutrition, and preventing non-communicable diseases.

With a similar focus on education, awareness and prevention, Hon. Andrea Álvarez Martín, UNITE member from Costa Rica since 2022, supported a bill on neutral packaging of tobacco products, who was already approved by the Social Issues Committee, and now awaits its discussion in plenary.

All the three leaders acknowledged that there were many challenges along the way, and that the role of women as leader parliamentarians is both important and demanding. To Hon. Ghati, women parliamentarians have to fight the lack of parity and women leadership in committees, which is still a reality in every country around the world and not an exception in Kenya. Patriarchal societies and established gender norms constitute a big challenge when it comes to advancing health policies from and for women. Hon. Scaglia, simultaneously, faced the male-led system and bureaucracy when engaging with world leaders to advocate for more effective infectious diseases policies.

We know how to fight. We are perseverant. Most of us experience the difficulties of being women in politics (…). We know how to deal with difficult, impossible and sometimes forgotten causes.

– Hon. Gisela Scaglia, Argentina

But for all three, the solution is out there: we need to reach parity in parliaments and increase women’s leadership positions. For Hon. Álvarez Martín, women must reach health-relevant committees, and can support the inclusion of more women in the future, who will assure that gender is mainstreamed across health and other policies, as mentioned by Hon. Ghati. According to Hon. Scaglia, women have a special view of the world, also because they were the ones in charge of their homes and families in the most difficult times, such as wars, pandemics, economic or humanitarian crises. They have a “sense of the human problems that serves to positively impact the world”, and their views and voices must be included in any health policy worldwide.

Parliament allows women to have a platform where they can strengthen their initiatives in favor of the general population and, of course, women. This platform presents women with the opportunity to participate in international networks such as UNITE, where one can share best practices.

– Hon. Andrea Álvarez Martín, Costa Rica

The stories of Hon. Dennitah Ghati, Hon. Gisela Scaglia, and Hon. Andrea Álvarez Martín are a testament to the power of women’s leadership in advancing health policies. These parliamentarians are breaking down barriers and challenging entrenched gender norms to create a more equitable world for all. Their work highlights the importance of increasing women’s representation in political leadership and ensuring that gender is mainstreamed across health policies. On this International Women’s Day, UNITE is happy to celebrate the important work of all women parliamentarians in our network who are fighting for a world where everyone has access to good health and wellbeing, no matter their gender or background.