Impact of the pandemic and confinement measures on lethal violence against women in Mexico and Colombia

The health emergency caused by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic led to limitations and changes in mobility that transformed the behaviour of both society in general and criminal actors in particular, having an impact on crime rates. This led some analysts to consider the possibility of a "rebound effect on crime" after the end of the pandemic's safe haven. The aim of this article is to review the impact of the pandemic and its confinement measures on lethal violence against women in Mexico and Colombia. To do so, by means of a descriptive statistical exercise, we analyse the trend in homicide behaviour in both countries disaggregated by gender, focusing the analysis on 2019, 2020 and 2021, years considered as pre-pandemic, pandemic and post-pandemic periods. The findings demonstrate the lack of evidence of a significant increase in homicide, female homicide and femicide offences relative to the pre-pandemic period. Homicides of women and femicides show a continuity in the chain of violence against women throughout their live