Monday Lunch Live
Implementing gender equality and reducing sexual harassment in all areas of health and medical research
3 March 2025.
UN Women Australia’s theme for International Women's Day 2025 is ‘March Forward’, which reminds us that progress is not just about reflection but about taking decisive, bold steps to turn our commitments into action. This is our moment to drive change and ensure a truly equal future for all women and girls.
Inspired by this theme, this special International Women's Day webinar hosted by the VCCC Alliance will explore issues raised in the report ‘Respect in Research’, about implementing gender equality and reducing sexual harassment in all areas of health and medical research.
We’re welcoming a stellar panel of high impact women from the health and medical research sector, including cancer clinicians and researchers, to join the discussion and share their experiences, good and bad, and examples of decisive steps forward to stamp out sex and gender harassment.
So what did the Respect in Research report tell us?
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Health and medical research workplaces have been identified as higher risk for sexual harassment, with reports from across a number of academic and health environments citing high prevalence rates of up to 50%, compared to the national prevalence rate of 33% across all workplaces.
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Significant under-reporting of incidents remains a major barrier for organisations to appropriately monitor, respond to and mitigate this risk, with 82% of people who experience sexual harassment not formally reporting.
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Harassment can have a significant impact on the careers of victims and failure to prevent and respond appropriately contributes to the ‘leaky pipeline’ which results in low representation of women in health and medical research leadership.
The Respect in Research (2023) report was led by the Women in Science Parkville Precinct (WiSPP) in collaboration with the Australian Alliance of Medical Research Institutes (AAMRI) and funded by the Victorian Department of Jobs, Skills, Industries and Regions. It is a sector specific report, and different to sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins foundational workplace report Respect@Work, published in 2020.
Chair
Professor Sanchia Aranda AM
Board Chair, VCCC Alliance
Professor of Health Services Research, University of Melbourne and Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre.
Professor Sanchia Aranda AM is regarded as one of the world’s pre-eminent experts in cancer control. With more than four decades’ experience as a clinician, researcher, educator and administrator, she has served as CEO of Cancer Council Australia, President of the Union for International Cancer Control and President of the International Society of Nurses in Cancer Care.
Professor Christobel Saunders AO
Professor Christobel Saunders, AO is the James Steward Chair of Surgery and Head of the Department of Surgery at The University of Melbourne. She is also a consultant surgeon at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute. With over 30 years of experience, she has made significant contributions to breast cancer research, including clinical trials of new treatments and health services research. Her awards and honours include the Order of Australia, Uccio Querci della Rovere Award, International Women’s Day WA Women’s Hall of Fame Inductee, and WA Scientist of the Year. She has published over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles and sits on the boards of several health and research organisations.
Professor Sherene Loi
Prof Loi is a Medical Oncologist specialised in breast cancer treatment as well as a clinician scientist (group leader) with expertise in genomics, immunology and drug development at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. She is recognised internationally as a leading clinician scientist whose work has led to new insights into the breast cancer immunology field as well as leading international clinical trials in breast cancer immunotherapy.
Dr Miranda Smith
Dr Miranda Smith is passionate about community engagement, scientific communication and equity in public health. She co-ordinates the Australian Partnership for Preparedness Research on Infectious diSease Emergencies (APPRISE), funded by the Australian Department of Health and Aged Care and based at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity. In this role, she provides strategic research support and leadership to the executive and research teams, engaging with a diverse network of researchers, policy makers and other stakeholders.
Professor Sarah Russell
Prof Sarah Russell is an immunologist and cell biologist, interested in understanding how immune cell development occurs, and how polarity and tissue organisation influences cell fate. To achieve this, she has a joint position at Swinburne University and the Peter Mac, where her group combines immunological expertise with expertise in physics and mathematics for single cell microscopic imaging analysis. Alongside her immunology research, Sarah has been very active in promoting equity in research over the past 10 years.
Dr Jessica Da Gama Duarte
Dr Jessica Duarte is a tumour immunologist and biochemist specialising in B cells and antibody production in solid tumours and the discovery of novel diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive cancer biomarkers. Dr Duarte has recently been appointed Laboratory Head and Senior Research Fellow at the School of Translational Medicine in Monash University. She was a member of the ONJCRI Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee (2021-2025) focused on promoting and supporting a diverse workforce and took part in the AAMRI deliberative panels focused on Sex and Gender in Medical Research (2023). Following from this, she recently joined the Centre for Sex and Gender Equity in Health and Medicine (CSGEHM) Health and Social Research Working Group (2024-).
Course Details
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