COVID-19 Threatens Progress Toward Gender Equity Within Academic Medicine.

Women remain underrepresented within academic medicine despite past and present efforts to promote gender equity. The authors discuss how the COVID-19 pandemic could stymie progress toward gender parity within the biomedical workforce and limit the retention and advancement of women in science and medicine. Women faculty face distinct challenges as they navigate the impact of shelter-in-place and social distancing on work and home life. An unequal division of household labor and family care between men and women means women faculty are vulnerable to inequities that may develop in the workplace as they strive to maintain academic productivity and professional development without adequate assistance with domestic tasks and family care. Emerging data suggest that gender differences in academic productivity may be forthcoming as a direct result of the pandemic. Existing gender inequities in professional visibility, networking, and collaboration may be exacerbated as activities transition from in-person to virtual environments and create new barriers to advancement. Meanwhile, initiatives designed to promote gender equity within academic medicine may lose key funding due to the economic impact of COVID-19 on higher education. To ensure that the gender gap within academic medicine does not widen, the authors call upon academic leaders and the broader biomedical community to support women faculty through deliberate actions that promote gender equity, diversity, and inclusion. The authors provide several recommendations, including faculty needs assessments; review of gender bias within tenure-clock-extension offers; more opportunities for mentorship, sponsorship, and professional recognition; and financial commitments to support equity initiatives. Leadership for these efforts should be at the institutional and departmental levels, and leaders should ensure a gender balance on task forces and committees to avoid overburdening women faculty with additional service work. Together, these strategies will contribute to the development of a more equitable workforce capable of transformative medical discovery and care.

Implementation of the NIH Sex-Inclusion Policy: Attitudes and Opinions of Study Section Members.

OBJECTIVE: On January 25th, 2016, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) implemented a policy requiring investigators to consider sex as a biological variable (SABV) within their grant submissions. We surveyed NIH study section members in 2016 and 2017 to determine their attitudes toward the policy and their perceptions regarding its implementation. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Members of standing study sections and special emphasis panels who met in May, June, or July of 2016 and 2017, and had a publicly accessible e-mail address, were invited to participate in the survey (n = 4376 and n = 4710, respectively). The survey assessed participant demographics, knowledge and awareness of the SABV policy, and opinions regarding its utility and implementation. RESULTS: A combined total of 1161 study section members participated in the survey for a response rate of 10.2% in 2016 and 15.1% in 2017. Respondents thought it was important for NIH-funded research to consider SABV (63% vs. 68%, p = 0.141) and that it will improve rigor and reproducibility (54% vs. 58%, p = 0.208). In terms of implementation, respondents indicated that the percentage of grants, which have successfully addressed and incorporated the policy, has significantly increased over time (p < 0.0001 for all endpoints). However, open-ended comments revealed concern for federal research funding, the overuse of experimental animals, and uncertainty surrounding grant scoring, as it relates to the SABV policy. CONCLUSIONS: In this study, we show improving attitudes toward the sex-inclusive policy at NIH and that a statistically significant number of grants are addressing sex as a biological variable appropriately in their submissions. These data suggest the policy is becoming more well accepted, and it is thus anticipated that the reproducibility of scientific reports will increase over time and new discoveries using sex as a biological variable are on the horizon.