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Key messages Gender-neutral policy can depoliticise gender and marginalise trans people. Intersectional and gender-aware politics resists reproducing the gender binary when promoting gender equality.

The gendered effects of the Covid-19 pandemic have been documented globally by feminist researchers and activists. However, less explored are the strategies employed by feminist activists to navigate such challenges. Mobilizing feminist scholarship on the politics of crisis and the study of feminist movements, this article presents findings from a collaborative research project that sought to understand how the crisis engendered by the COVID-19 pandemic is impacting on feminist activism in Northern Ireland (NI) post-Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. Drawing on focus groups with local activists, we outline how the effects of the pandemic compound the long history of marginalization and de-prioritization of gender equality and justice seen throughout the peace process and its multiple crises. We trace how the activists who participated to this study have continued to organize collectively through online networks, gender-sensitive policy recommendations, proposals for a comprehensive recovery plan, as well as through mutual aid practices that have a long lineage in feminist activism amidst the conflict and in NI's unfinished peace. The context of NI offers a valuable case study to trouble the temporalities and boundaries of global crises, deepening our understanding of feminist strategies for collective organizing in complex political terrains.

BACKGROUND: Diabetes prevalence, as well as that of pre-diabetes, is rapidly increasing in South Africa. Individuals with pre-diabetes have a high risk of developing type 2 diabetes, which is reversible with a change in lifestyle. If left untreated, diabetes can lead to serious health complications. Our objective was to assess the prevalence of diabetes and pre-diabetes, and to investigate the associated risk factors of each in the South African population. METHOD: This study made use of the South African Demographic Health Survey 2016 data. The study participants included 6442 individuals aged 15 years and older. A generalized additive mixed model was employed to account for the complex survey design of the study as well as well spatial autocorrelation in the data. RESULTS: The observed prevalence of pre-diabetes and diabetes was 67% and 22%, respectively. Among those who had never been tested for diabetes prior to the survey, 10% of females and 6% of males were found to be diabetic, and 67% of both males and females were found to be pre-diabetic. Thus, a large proportion of the South African population remains undiagnosed. The model revealed both common and uncommon factors significantly associated with pre-diabetes and diabetes. This highlights the importance of considering diabetic status as a three-level categorical outcome, rather than binary. In addition, significant interactions between some of the lifestyle factors, demographic factors and anthropometric measures were revealed, which indicates that the effects each these factors have on the likelihood of an individual being pre-diabetic or diabetic is confounded by other factors. CONCLUSION: The risk factors for diabetes and pre-diabetes are many and complicated. Individuals need to be aware of their diabetic status before health complications arise. It is therefore important for all stakeholders in government and the private sector of South Africa to get involved in providing education and creating awareness about diabetes. Regular testing of diabetes, ...