Peru and Panama have issued strict quarantines with a gendered twist: Men and women each have their own designated days when they are allowed to leave the house and purchase essentials such as food and medicine.
Panama, which put in place the policy for 15 days on Wednesday, assigned Monday, Wednesday and Friday to women, while Saturday, Tuesday and Thursday are reserved for men. On Sunday, no one is permitted to leave.
It’s the opposite in Peru, which announced the new restrictions on Thursday: men there instead have the Monday schedule in a policy set to last through April 12.
“We have to get fewer people to be on the streets every day,” Peru’s President Martin Vizcarra said Thursday during a virtual news conference, according to Reuters.
Vizcarra defended the decision to divide the days along a gender binary, saying it was easier for police to identify violators this way compared, for example, with designating schedules based on the serial numbers of identity documents, Reuters reported.
Vizcarra, however, specified that the restrictions would not violate the rights of transgender people and pledged that the armed forces and police would be provided clear guidelines to avoid incidents of transphobia, according to local media reports.
In Panama, men and women are only allowed out of the house for two hours during their respective shopping days based on numbers on their identity documents. Advocacy groups have reported some instances of trans people being targeted there.
Reaction on social media was mixed: Some said the measure was bound to create issues for gender-nonconforming people, while others defended it as the easiest way to split the country in half.
In Peru, some praised it as the government’s first official acknowledgement of trans identity. And some women called it a dream come true, saying the streets would finally be free of men.
Teo Armus contributed to this report.
