The Roots of an Epidemic: Part 4

How Gender Affects the Global Tuberculosis Epidemic

From risk factors to treatment, an illustrated exploration of how the patriarchy shapes one of the world's deadliest diseases

52 sec read

The Roots of an Epidemic logo depicting a flowering tree and bacteria under a microscope

Read the previous installment: “The Gendered Realities of the Tuberculosis Epidemic

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Is smoking “unladylike”? Do “real men” avoid asking for help if they’re feeling sick? Gender–including stereotypes like these–can influence the risk of diseases like tuberculosis, as well as diagnosis and treatment.

Understanding gender dynamics and biases is important for designing both effective TB responses and health systems more broadly–it can help people delivering services alleviate, rather than reinforce, existing inequities.

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Panel about smoking as a risk factor for TB
Pair of panels: one about mining as a TB risk factor, one about postpartum women having higher rates of TB
Panel about women's higher rates of malnutrition
Panel about how men are less likely to seek medical care
Pair of panels about women's restrictions on making decisions about their healthcare
Panel about higher TB stigma for women
Panel about health workers tendency to be more dismissive of women's health concerns
Pair of panels: one about queerphobia and TB, one about women as caretakers
Panel about men being less likely to finish a course of medical treatment
Panel about extrapulmonary TB

Words by Paula Akugizibwe
Illustrations by Darren Garrett

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Footnotes
Panel 5: Other factors related to poverty–which disproportionately affects women–are also associated with TB.

Panel 10: In some settings, this is tied to the belief that women with TB will be infertile (see panel 17).

Panel 12: This bias has been observed for various medical conditions, including pain.

Panel 13: Read about a transgender sex worker’s experience with TB and social stigma here. Past efforts ensure that the global health agenda is inclusive of queer and trans rights have been met with resistance.

Panel 16: Greater mobility may contribute to this–for example, employment-related migration or financial freedom to move between providers.

Panel 17: Genital TB is increasingly recognized as a major contributor to infertility in some settings.

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Read the previous installment: “The Gendered Realities of the Tuberculosis Epidemic

The Roots of an Epidemic logo depicting a flowering tree and bacteria under a microscope

How We Get To Next was a magazine that explored the future of science, technology, and culture from 2014 to 2019. The Roots of an Epidemic is a four-part series on tuberculosis, the leading cause of death from an infectious agent around the world.