“WOMEN HAVE TO HANDLE EVERYTHING”: COVID-19 AND THE MENTAL
HEALTH OF WOMEN WHO ARE MEMBERS OF A SOCIAL ASSISTANCE
REFERENCE CENTER IN THE COUNTRYSIDE OF THE NORTHEAST
COVID-19 is an infectious disease caused by the new Coronavirus, first identified in
December 2019, in the city of Wuhan, China. In January 2020, World Health Organization
(WHO) decreed that the outbreak caused by the COVID-19 constituted a Public Health
Emergency of International Concern, being categorized as a pandemic. This has affected a
large part of the population and caused structural consequences at both micro and macro
levels. It has been observed that, in addition to the economic repercussions, the advent of the
pandemic reverberated in an overwhelming way in the lives of people in situations of social
vulnerability, especially women's. This study aimed to understand, alongside with the
technical team of a Social Assistance Reference Center (CRAS) in a city in the countryside of
Rio Grande do Norte, the repercussions of the Covid-19 pandemic on mental health of women
who benefit from the service. This is an intervention-research of a multimethod nature, based
on the theoretical-methodological framework of Institutional Analysis (IA). To this end, three
rounds of conversations were carried out with the team's technicians; consultations with the
service's medical records to map the demands that occurred during the period between 2020
and 2021; and participant observation with records in the research diaries. The data were
analyzed through important concepts from the theoretical-methodological framework of IA.
Among the data collected, what drew attention in the research was the fact that the public
benefited from the service, during the period analyzed, was mostly adult women, with a lower
level of education than complete secondary education, in extreme poverty, and predominantly
beneficiaries of the extinct “Bolsa Família” Program. Regarding the results of this research,
we have observed changes in the demands of CRAS, such as the increase in demand for
eventual benefits and the emergence of mental health issues related to the repercussions of the
pandemic. Furthermore, we have noticed significant changes in the work process of the
service affecting the professionals, in order to analyze their implications. Therefore, such
studies are fundamental to understanding the particularities of each region, in addition to
providing reflections on the repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic for the population, in
order to think about policies that may respond to such demands.