Data from the italian network of anti-violence centres during the covid-19 pandemic

Gender-based violence (GBV), which counts one out of three women worldwide experiencing violence in their lifetime, has been defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a "global public health problem of epidemic proportions". During the current COVID-19 pandemic, the WHO and other international authorities have warned about the increased risk of GBV related to more time spent indoors, isolation from social and protective networks, and greater social and economic stress related to both the epidemic and response measures. The Italian Women's Network Against Violence (D.i.Re) conducted an initial monitoring campaign during this lockdown period to investigate if and to what extent the COVID-19 pandemic affects male violence against women, and began a second monitoring campaign, similar to the previous one, during the light lockdown period (from 6 November to 3 December 2020) currently in effect in Italy. In this paper, the data collected during the two monitoring campaigns will be presented and compared with data collected in the last annual survey (2019) in order to show how much forced coexistence during lockdown periods exacerbates situations of violence against women in the home.