In this article, originally posted in the Monash Lens, the authors discuss the issue of Women, work and the poverty trap: Time for a fair go to support health and wellbeing for Australian women.
Extract
It’s well-known that the middle years for most women are a perfect storm of competing stresses, from intergenerational caring, to hot flushes and cooling libidos.
But what’s surprising is new data in our paper, led by Joanne Enticott and Graham Meadows, Mental Health in Australia: Psychological Distress Reported in Six Consecutive Cross-Sectional National Surveys From 2001 to 2018, which shows middle-aged women have gone from a place of relative mental calm, to reporting the highest level of serious mental distress.
Almost one in five women aged between 55 and 64 are reporting high distress. Over a 16-year period (2001 to 2017-18), rates of very high distress rose substantially from 3.5% to 7.2%, and high/very high distress from 12.4% to 18.7% – a rise higher than any other group.
So, what is distressing middle-aged women?
One clue is income. This dramatic rise in mental distress is closely associated with financial insecurity. A large portion of Australian women grow poorer as they move along a socially and politically engineered, gendered poverty trajectory.
Continue reading the full article at the Monash Lens…
Associate Professor Magdalena Simonis AM is a Past President of the AFMW (2020-2023), former President of VMWS (2013 & 2017-2020) and current AFMW National Coordinator (2024-2026). She is a full time clinician who also holds positions on several not for profit organisations, driven by her passion for bridging gaps across the health sector. She is a leading women’s health expert, keynote speaker, climate change and gender equity advocate and government advisor. Magda is member of The Australian Health Team contributing monthly articles.
Magdalena was awarded a lifetime membership of the RACGP for her contributions which include past chair of Women in General Practice, longstanding contribution to the RACGP Expert Committee Quality Care, the RACGP eHealth Expert Committee. She is regularly invited to comment on primary care research though mainstream and medical media and contributes articles on various health issues through newsGP and other publications.
Magdalena has represented the RACGP at senate enquiries and has worked on several National Health Framework reviews. She is author of the RACGP Guide on Female Genital Cosmetic Surgery and co-reviewer of the RACGP Red Book Women’s Health Chapter, and reviewer of the RACGP White book
Both an RACGP examiner and University examiner, she undertakes general practice research and is a GP Educator with the Safer Families Centre of Research Excellence, which develops education tools to assist the primary care sector identify, respond to and manage family violence . Roles outside of RACGP include the Strategy and Policy Committee for Breast Cancer Network Australia, Board Director of the Melbourne University Teaching Health Clinics and the elected GP representative to the AMA Federal Council. In 2022. she was award the AMA (Vic) Patrick Pritzwald-Steggman Award 2022, which celebrates a doctor who has made an exceptional contribution to the wellbeing of their colleagues and the community and was listed as Women’s Agenda 2022 finalist for Emerging Leader in Health.
Magdalena has presented at the United Nations as part of the Australian Assembly and was appointed the Australian representative to the World Health Organisation, World Assembly on COVID 19, by the Medical Women’s International Association (MWIA) in 2021. In 2023, A/Professor Simonis was included on the King’s COVID-19 Champion’s list and was also awarded a Member (AM) in the General Division for significant service to medicine through a range of roles and to women’s health.
