Thailand and Albania co-hosted the Organization for Security Co-operation in Europe Asian Partners for Co-operation Group (APCG) Meeting. Dr. Apisamai Srirangson, Director of the Bangkok Mental Health Rehabilitation and Recovery Centre (BMRC) at Bangkok Hospital and Deputy Spokesperson of the Thailand Centre for COVID-19 Situation Administration, and Dr. Soawapak Hinjoy, Director of the Office of International Cooperation at the Department of Disease Control, shared Thailand’s best practices in promoting central role of women in combating Covid-19.

On 2 July 2021, Thailand and Albania co-hosted the Organization for Security Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Asian Partners for Co-operation Group (APCG) Meeting on the topic of “Empowering Women Leadership during Global Health Emergencies”. The Meeting was led by H.E. Ms. Morakot Sriswasdi, Thai Ambassador to Austria and Permanent Representative of Thailand to the United Nations and other International Organizations in Vienna, with Dr. Apisamai Srirangson, Director of the Bangkok Mental Health Rehabilitation and Recovery Centre (BMRC) at Bangkok Hospital and Assistant Spokesperson of the Thailand Centre for COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA), and Dr. Soawapak Hinjoy, Director of the Office of International Cooperation at the Department of Disease Control, shared their work experiences and Thailand’s success stories during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Meeting was attended by more than 80 ambassadors, heads of international organisations, and officials both in Vienna and from the OSCE Member States and Asian Partners, including H.E. Ms. Helga Schmid, OSCE Secretary General, and a representative from UN Women.

The Meeting realised the problem of gender disparity in the decision-making process related to the mitigation of the impacts of COVID-19 on the public health system, society and the global economy at large. The Meeting further stressed the importance of promoting women leadership in the public health sector and reaffirmed the WHO’s continuous efforts to work with countries around the world to achieve gender equality and to elevate women’s role in public health at all levels.

During the panel discussion, Dr. Apisamai shared her experiences in crisis communication during the COVID-19 pandemic under the CCSA, whose task is to coordinate government responses to the pandemic under a single command. She highlighted the unique capacity of women policymakers to address in a logical and compassionate manner the problems of stigmatisation and discrimination against COVID-19 patients and migrant workers, while ensuring coordinated and inclusive policy responses. As part of Thailand’s whole-of-society approach to the pandemic, she also touched upon the role of the non-governmental sector, in particular the Thai Women’s Medical Association under the Royal Patronage of Her Majesty the Queen, which works to reinforce the presence of women in the medical sector and in response to the pandemic.

Dr. Soawapak discussed the roles and responsibilities of Village Health Volunteers (VHVs) in Thailand, 80% of whom are women, in promoting health literacy on the ground and educating villagers about effective measures to protect themselves from the deadly virus. While locating transmission in the rural areas and tracking the cross-provincial spread of the COVID-19 virus remain daunting challenges in Thailand, female VHVs have proven to be very adaptable to each local context and successful in encouraging higher levels of public compliance with disease control measures. In this connection, the VHVs efforts are widely regarded as one of the key factors in helping to minimise local transmission within Thai local communities.

Taking into account the increased gender disparity and gender-based violence during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Meeting shared the concern of women remaining disproportionately under-represented in the response policy, where the promotion of women’s economic empowerment and the idea of gender equality must be rooted for. Many of the participants echoed that the economic and social recovery in the post-COVID era must be inclusive and gender responsive.

The APCG meeting is an ambassadorial-level meeting which takes place 5 times annually and serves as the main forum for open and interactive dialogue on security issues of common interest between the OSCE and its Asian Partners. The meeting underscored the importance and leading role of women in the fight against the spread of COVID-19 which is an opportunity for Thailand to build confidence in its solid healthcare system and showcase its success in the proactive promotion of comprehensive health security, as well as underscored the mutual effort and interest for cooperation between the OSCE and its Asian Partners towards empowering women leadership in times of crisis.