The Unintended Consequences of COVID-19 Pandemic Lockdown

The coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic has brought the entire global economy to a complete standstill with significant job losses across all industries, the result of which has been increased inequality and poverty. The most vulnerable members of society including children, women, persons with disabilities, the elderly are suffering during isolation (Mutavati et al., 2020).There is a large body of global literature that links economic security to various kinds of violence against women and children, and at a household and individual level this has been linked to poor coping strategies (Peterman,2020). There is limited research on the link between crisis, disasters and domestic violence against women, but according to Jenkins and Phillips (2008) domestic violence increases during disasters. This is further highlighted by Fraser, 2020; Palermo and Peterman, 2011) in Peterman (2020), that unrests and crises have been linked to incidence of violence against women and children, and pandemics are no exception.