Reviewer’s report
Title: 
Violence against housemaids in an Ethiopian town during the early phase
of the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional study
Version: 
1 
Date: 
23 Feb 2022
Reviewer's report:
- The subject addressed is within the scope of the journal. 
- Aside from the aim stated in the title, the research gap and the goals of the
research are not specified which leads to the reader missing the significance of
the research.
- The introduction section is detailed, but needs a significant amount of
reorganization. It could be strengthened by adding more recent references.
- The research contributions of the paper should be articulated more clearly. The
abstract is not representative of the content and contributions of the paper. The
abstract does not seem to properly convey the rigor of research.
- Please add as sentence or two to clearly recap how your study differs from
what has already been done in literature to ascertain the contributions more
strongly.
- However, the manuscript, in its present form, contains several weaknesses.
Appropriate revisions to the following points should be undertaken in order to
justify recommendation for publication. 
-It is suggested to add articles entitled "Jatta et al. Preparedness of Healthcare
Workers towards Handling COVID-19 Outbreak in the Gambia", "Lamptey &
Serwaa. The Use of Zipline Drones Technology for COVID-19 Samples
Transportation in Ghana" and "M. Khairulbahri. Modeling the Effect of
Asymptomatic Cases, Social Distancing, and Lockdowns in the First and Second
waves of the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case Study of Italy" to the literature
review.
- For readers to quickly catch your contribution, it would be better to highlight
major difficulties and challenges, and your original achievements to overcome
them, in a clearer way in abstract and introduction. 
- This raises some concerns regarding the potential overlap with authors
previous works. The authors should explicitly state the novel contribution of this
work, the similarities and the differences of this work with their previous
publications.
- Some assumptions are stated in various sections. Justifications should be
provided on these assumptions. Evaluation on how they will affect the results
should be made.
- Some key parameters are not mentioned. The rationale on the choice of the
particular set of parameters should be explained with more details. Have the
authors experimented with other sets of values? What are the sensitivities of
these parameters on the results?
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No
Declaration of competing interests
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interests, considering the following questions:
1
. 
Have you in the past five years received reimbursements, fees, funding, or
salary from an organisation that may in any way gain or lose financially
from the publication of this manuscript, either now or in the future?
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or in the future?
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Do you hold or are you currently applying for any patents relating to the
content of the manuscript?
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Have you received reimbursements, fees, funding, or salary from an
organization that holds or has applied for patents relating to the content of
the manuscript?
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Do you have any other financial competing interests?
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Do you have any non-financial competing interests in relation to this
paper?
If you can answer no to all of the above, write 'I declare that I have no competing
interests' below. If your reply is yes to any, please give details below.
I declare that I have no competing interests
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Is the study design appropriate to answer the research question (including the use
of appropriate controls), and are the conclusions supported by the evidence
presented?
Yes
Are the methods sufficiently described to allow the study to be repeated?
Yes
Is the use of statistics and treatment of uncertainties appropriate?
Yes
Is the presentation of the work clear?
Yes
Are the images in this manuscript (including electrophoretic gels and blots) free
from apparent manipulation?
No