Why is Women’s Health still the most underinvested areas within global healthcare circuits?
TL;DR
The Problem: Despite representing 50% of the population, women’s health accounts for only 6% of private-sector healthcare funding globally.
The Flaw in the Model: The industry currently treats women's health through a fragmented, "episodic" lens (focusing almost exclusively on reproductive care) rather than a lifelong biological continuum.
The Strategic Opportunity: Global pharma and leading UK Life Science companies have a massive commercial and clinical opportunity to build integrated, longitudinal care ecosystems that address chronic, underfunded conditions like endometriosis and menopause.
1.0 Background and Key Statistical Realities
Despite contributing to almost half of the world’s population, women are still underrepresented across areas of education, politics, the workforce, and healthcare.
Within the healthcare umbrella
- ~2% of global medical funding is focused on pregnancy, childbirth and towards women’s reproductive health
- Between 2020-2025, women’s health funding received globally only accounted for 6% of all private-sector funding (amounting to $175 billion)
- Despite significant disease burden of conditions like Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, PCOS, endometriosis (1 in every 10 women), osteoporosis, menopause, they remain significantly underfunded
Too often, women’s health is limited to maternity/reproductive care. In reality, a woman’s health needs to be considered as a lifelong continuum right before adolescence till aging. Broadly, women’s health can be equated across the following six stages
Pre-adolescents/ Pre-pubertal:
Anaemia, precocious puberty, vulvovaginitis to name a few
Pubertal:
PCOS, PCOD, endometriosis and other conditions
Reproductive and fertility phase (pregnancy):
Infertility, due to infertility, pregnancy related complications, assisted reproductive technologies like IVF and IUIs
Perimenopause:
Symptoms management like hot flashes , hormone imbalances, weight gain, metabolic and neuroendocrine symptom
Menopause and other associated ailments:
Bone health, cardiovascular risk, uterine cancer, endometrial, cervical and/or breast cancer risks
Post menopausal care:
Healthy ageing with regular annual checkups for gynaecological cancers, bone health, cardiovascular health and other ageing ailments
While groups from pubertal through reproductive phases are still largely covered and addressed, other aspects of women’s health are grossly ignored. It becomes even more imperative, that with increasing life expectancy, it is important to explore and increase investments , research and funding specially through perimenopausal and post-menopausal phases.
2.0 Reframing Women’s Health: Scientific Approach
Globally, healthcare systems view and treat women’s health through fragmented, specialty driven models as an episodic care. Care is usually divided across specialities like paediatrics, gynaecology/obstetrics, advanced fertility specialists, oncology, endocrinology and geriatrics. However scientific models and real-world evidence support a biological driven approach recognizing that hormonal regulation, metabolic pathways, and inflammatory processes are deeply interconnected across life stages
What this implies in General Practice:
- Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) is not just a fertility or reproductive disorder; it is co-related with insulin resistance increasing lifetime risk of Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease
- Endometriosis is simply not pelvic pain, but a chronic inflammatory condition directly related to fertility, issues in conception or sustaining the pregnancy
This also leads to delayed diagnosis as symptoms are co-related mainly in childbearing age.
Real world example would be-
A woman presenting with irregular periods and weight gain in early life is advised lifestyle changes and is rarely screened for metabolic risks early on. Later, due to infertility issues, will she only be tested further for ultrasound scans, insulin resistance testing and Anti-Mullerian Hormone Test (AMH)*, to co-relate and confirm PCOS
*AMH is not a sole test for confirming PCOS specially in adolescent stages. It is usually a marker for determining the ovarian reserve of a female and used for indirect confirmation at an adult child bearing stage.
A woman presents with abnormal uterine bleeding, in developed geographies like EU/UK and the US, she may have access to advanced diagnostics (ultrasound, hysteroscopy, biopsy) relatively quickly based on her insurance coverage and access to advanced hospital settings.
However, in many developing geographies and/or lower socio-economic conditions, there would most likely be a delay in investigation, lack of awareness, normalization of symptoms as a hormonal variation that would further delay diagnosis
The same can be observed for delayed breast cancer screening and late detections also leads to survival disparities despite advances in chemotherapies.
One Pattern seems clear: In episodic vs. longitudinal care, healthcare systems are designed to respond to events (pain, infertility, cancer diagnosis) rather than managing trajectories (could be hormonal, metabolic, ageing pathways) which ultimately increases health cost burden and significantly reduces quality of life (QoL).
A Life cycle model can change the outcome It would
- Identify early risk in adolescences ( e.g. PCOS)
- Help monitor transitions (like perimenopause screenings)
- Improve QoL and also reduce miscarriages or episodes of infertility (like endometriosis)
- Early detection and screening of cancer ultimately help integrate diagnostics (uterine, breast cancer screenings
3.0 What Governments Are Navigating Globally:
Despite persistent gaps, global healthcare systems in the US, EU and Middle East have started policy implementation measures to improve women’s health. However, efforts remain uneven and stage-specific rather than lifecycle-driven.
United States:
The US women’s health research has expanded its funding through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), including the Women’s Health Initiative and recent White House funding commitments to close research gaps in menopause and chronic conditions (~a planned USD$200 Mn). In parallel, it has also updated the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) guidelines to now recommend breast cancer screening from age 40. Gaps do remain, where access remains insurance-dependent, with limited standardization of menopause care.
United Kingdom:
Per revised Women’s Health Strategy and national screening programs through the National Health Service (NHS), as of May 2026, there has been a “community shift" to move care from hospitals to neighbourhood health centres.
Despite expansion of specialized services, significant capacity constraints remain, with gynaecology wait times having doubled since 2020. Additionally, access and social disparities while accessing treatment also has been observed in ethnic groups.
UAE / GCC:
Strengthened early detection via initiatives like the Pink Caravan Campaign^ and rapid expansion of breast and uterine diagnostics in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
The Gulf Cooperation Council—the UAE in particular has seen increasing collaborations in the region with pharma, diagnostics players, and healthcare providers to improve diagnostics and treatment infrastructure. Notable one being with AstraZeneca and M42 to advance precision medicine and hereditary breast cancer screening across the GCC. This will enable them to improve early identification specially of BRCA-related breast cancer risks and help personalize treatment pathways across the UAE, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, and Qatar.
However, lifecycle integration, especially menopause care remains limited.
^Pink Caravan Campaign: It is a Pan UAE breast cancer initiative for early detection of cancer and aims to raise awareness around breast cancer early detection and screening methods
India:
Has scaled maternal care through programs likeJanani Suraksha Yojana (JSY) to reduce maternal and neonatal mortality. The Indian government in the public setting has also expanded cancer screening under the The National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke (NPCDCS).
However, limited menopause awareness and uneven rural access persist specially across Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities.
4.0 The Way Forward: Strategic Imperatives to Fix Gaps
To address underinvestment and move from awareness to action,a multi-pronged approach is required:
Expand funding beyond a woman’s reproductive phase:
- Expand research into menopause, ageing, PCOS and endometriosis
- Incentivize pharma and biotech investment to boost funding
Build Integrated Care Eco-systems:
- Develop one stop woman focused clinics by integrating (lifecycle-based women’s health centres): fertility, endocrinology, oncology, ageing and preventive care
Strengthen Diagnostics infrastructure
through enhanced access to breast cancer screenings, Uterine/endometrial diagnostics, hormonal and metabolic testing
Expand and reform insurance coverage
to include fertility treatments, cover preventive screenings, and also include menopausal care
Invest in awareness, education and leverage digital health:
- Use AI and data analytics for predictive diagnostics, early risk prediction and offer personalized treatment solutions
- Increase access and awareness through workplace campaigns (especially in midlife segment)
Conclusion:
Women’s health is not a niche, it is a longitudinal, biologically complex, high impact healthcare stream
The future of healthcare will depend on innovative therapies, but also whether systems globally recognize women’s health as a continuous, investable lifecycle. Gaps once addressed can also help overall disease burden, improve existing quality of life (QoL) and ultimately create a path to building a happier and healthier half of the population.
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