• gender policy
• female scientists
• funding agency

The COVID-19 pandemic is exposing and exacerbating gender biases in science, calling on funders to play an active role in finding solutions. During the months in which COVID-19 measures required people to stay home, scientists with feminine-coded names submitted substantially fewer manuscripts than scientists with masculine-coded names, especially manuscripts about severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 and COVID-19 (1⇓–3). Such findings may be partly explained by the heavier teaching, service, and caregiving loads borne by White women and people of color in academia (3⇓–5). Researchers belonging to minoritized groups who are overrepresented among COVID-19 cases and deaths, such as racial and ethnic minorities, Indigenous Peoples, and disabled people (6⇓–8), may also be shouldering additional responsibilities to students, families, communities, or their own health (9).

As a consequence of the pandemic, researchers facing time constraints may be less able to pivot and contribute their expertise to COVID-19 research opportunities being rolled out by funding agencies worldwide. In addition to concerns about fairness, such inequities matter because funding female scientists is more likely to yield health research that appropriately accounts for sex and gender (10, 11). Similarly, funding Black scientists is more likely to result in health research that serves the needs of Black people (12). Failing to equitably fund researchers across groups may therefore mean short-changing the communities to which they belong and which they may be better equipped to study in nuanced, expert ways.

In February 2020, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) launched a rapid response COVID-19 funding competition. Compared to historical patterns, fewer female scientists applied for funding, success rates were lower among women who applied, and a smaller proportion of grants accounted for sex and gender in the research content. To address these issues, CIHR implemented a series of data-driven gender policy interventions in a second COVID-19 funding competition in April to May 2020. To expand the applicant pool, CIHR increased the application intake window from 8 d to 19 d and allowed submission of abridged biosketches rather than requiring the use of the longer online Canadian Common CV. To increase research quality, CIHR created a guidance document titled, “Why sex and gender need to be considered in COVID-19 research” (13) and required reviewers to evaluate the integration of sex, gender, and other identity factors (e.g., age, race, ethnicity, culture, religion, geography, education, disability, income, and sexual orientation) at all stages of the research process.

Results

The first competition funded 100 of 227 applications (overall success rate 44%). The second competition garnered greater application pressure, funding 139 of 1,488 applications (overall success rate 9%). From the first to second COVID competition, the proportion of applications submitted by principal investigators (PIs) who self-identified as female increased from 29 to 39%, and the proportion of successful applications with a female PI doubled from 22 to 45% (Table 1).

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Table 1.

Female application pressure and success rates before and after gender policy changes to the roll out of two COVID-19 funding opportunities

PIs who self-identified as being part of a visible minority community were 30% of applicants in both COVID competitions, and 28% and 26% of funded investigators in the first and second competitions, respectively (14). The numbers of applicants who identified as Indigenous, having a disability, gender fluid, nonbinary, or Two-Spirit were too low (counts under five in submitted applications, funded applications, or both) to report in a disaggregated way.

Biological sex factored into 55% and 94% of funded applications in the first and second competitions, respectively (Fig. 1). In the second competition, applications indicating that sex was considered in the proposed work were more likely to be funded (odds ratio [OR] 3.13, 95% CI 1.57 to 6.23). This was not the case in the first competition (OR 1.31, 95% CI 0.91 to 1.88).

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Fig. 1.

Integration of sex and gender within the research content of COVID-19 grant applications. Proportion of submitted and funded applications that addressed sex or gender considerations in the content of COVID-19 grant proposals during the first and second competitions. A breakdown of the submitted grants by COVID-19 research area is provided under the graph.

• Copyright © 2021 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.