Phone panel survey to evaluate how COVID-19 and related mitigation interventions are impacting women and children in Sierra Leone

COVID-19 is spreading in sub-Saharan Africa with increasing number of infected people and deaths. Sierra Leone is among the least-developed countries in the world. About 57% of the population live below the poverty line and 50% of households experience chronic food insecurity. Sierra Leone is a highly patriarchal society. Gender norms that are entrenched in culture and tradition make women and children vulnerable to the effects of poverty and underdevelopment. To contain the spread of COVID-19, the Government of Sierra Leone has since 25th March 2020 declared a state of public health emergency, imposed a curfew, used lockdowns to restrict movements, closed schools, and placed a ban on public gatherings. These measures are reportedly having the desired effect of reducing the spread of COVID-19. However, it is a widely held concern that the measures are impacting adversely on vulnerable sub-populations. The Government, United Nations agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are implementing interventions to minimize the effects of these measures. This study will explore how COVID-19 and related mitigation measures are impacting women and children through evaluating effects on; (1) Livelihoods and household incomes; (2) sexual and gender-based violence; (3) access to COVID-19 education messages; (4) exposure to misinformation; (5) children's access to alternative learning resources e.g. UNICEF-funded Ministry of Basic and Higher Education radio lessons. A panel of 900 women aged >18yrs (respondents) will be established through training the 180 members of 30 radio listeners clubs (RLCs) across the country. Each member will be trained on how to enrol five women within their locality using clearly-defined guidelines. The RLCs were formed in 2015 by Initiatives for Media Development (IMdev - http://imdev.media/), a local NGO, as part of its continued work with a network of 40 radio stations that are located in all districts in the country. The 900 respondents will be informed and consented to participate in the panel survey. A baseline survey will be conducted. This will be followed by two other surveys at thee-monthly intervals. A questionnaire that is mounted on tablets will be used to collect data that will be immediately uploaded. The phone interviews will be conducted by 10 (at least 5 will be females) trained interviewers. All interviews will be recorded for quality control purposes. Cross-sectional and cohort analysis will be performed at the end of each survey. The information will be shared with the agencies that are involved in the implementation of COVID-19 mitigation measures. This study is a collaboration between the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, IMdev and the Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children's Affairs, with technical support from UNICEF-Sierra Leone, UNWomen Sierra Leone and Statistics Sierra Leone. The findings will be used to improve the interventions that safeguard the livelihood and incomes of vulnerable women, eliminate sexual and gender-based violence, improve women's access to COVID-19 information and improve children's access to alternative learning. The study will contribute to Sierra Leone's achievement of the targets set in Sustainable Development Goals 1.5, 5.2, 5.1 and 4.1. Beyond the period of this study, the datasets and findings will be used by UK and non-UK researchers involved in epidemic preparedness, gender studies and economic analysis. The duration of the study is 12 months. The panel of 900 women respondents across the country will be maintained as a resource for future research on women and children in Sierra Leone.