The gender health gap is not new. It stretches from ancient Greece to the present day. Understanding this history is essential to understanding why change is so hard — and so necessary.
Hippocrates considered the female body less perfect than the male. This philosophical premise — that women's bodies were defective versions of men's — was embedded into the foundations of Western medicine.
Religious traditions stigmatised menstruation as impure. Male dominance in medicine reinforced the marginalisation of women's bodies and their health concerns. The concept of "hysteria" pathologised any female behaviour that deviated from norms.
Medical androcentrism led to extreme, harmful practices — including forced sterilisation and extreme invasive procedures — performed on women labelled as mentally ill or "hysterical."
Women begin to enter medical schools in small numbers, challenging the entirely male-dominated field. However, they faced systemic barriers to career advancement and research leadership that persist today.
Clinical research adopts the Caucasian male as the default study population. Female participants are excluded due to "hormonal complexity" — but this scientific rationale masks deep-seated gender bias.
Pregnant women given thalidomide for morning sickness gave birth to babies with severe limb defects. The disaster, while important, had an unintended consequence: it reinforced the blanket exclusion of pregnant and potentially pregnant women from all clinical trials for decades.
Major cardiovascular trials and HIV/AIDS research almost entirely exclude women. Treatments developed are based on male physiology and later applied to women without evidence of their safety or efficacy.
US legislation requires inclusion of women and minorities in NIH-funded clinical research. A landmark moment — though compliance remained inconsistent and enforcement weak for many years.
Requires proportionate gender inclusion in EU clinical trials and mandates sex-disaggregated analysis. A major step forward — but implementation varies widely and implicit bias is not addressed.
Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines provide international standards for reporting sex and gender across all stages of research — helping close the knowledge gap from within science.
Despite decades of advocacy, over 80% of preclinical drug safety studies are still conducted solely in male mice. The structural bias remains deeply embedded in how science is done.
The European Parliament resolution on sexual and reproductive health explicitly acknowledges obstetric violence as a form of gender-based violence for the first time at EU level.
European Commission, EMA, and national regulatory agencies launch ACT EU to increase clinical trial activity and diversity. Target: 10% increase in EU trials over 5 years.
Directive 2024/1385 on combatting violence against women and domestic violence must be transposed in all member states by June 2027. Criminalises forced marriage and genital mutilation; guarantees SRH services for victims.
Adopted March 7, 2025. Outlines principles for a gender-equal society: full access to quality healthcare including sexual and reproductive care, protection from violence, financial independence, and representation in public life.
The most comprehensive EU study to date on gender inequalities in medical research, drug development, and access to care. This website is based on its findings. It calls for sweeping reforms across data collection, clinical trials, education, and healthcare systems.
New EMA guideline calls for inclusion of pregnant and breastfeeding individuals in development of all new drugs — a paradigm shift toward protecting and including, rather than excluding, these groups.
New EU-funded projects: €7M for endometriosis research, €11M for AI-powered cardiovascular risk assessment in menopausal women, and €30M for medication safety during pregnancy and breastfeeding.
The 2025 European Parliament study represents both a comprehensive assessment of how far we've come — and an urgent call to close the remaining gaps. The convergence of new regulation, new funding, and growing political will creates a unique window for structural change.
But without enforcement, without mandatory sex-disaggregated data, without investment proportionate to disease burden, and without addressing the cultural attitudes that underpin the gap — the statistics in this website will remain the same a decade from now.
Adopted March 7. Full healthcare access as a core principle.
All member states must transpose Directive 2024/1385 by June 2027.
€5 billion programme concludes — will results show measurable improvement?
Closing the women's health gap could add $1 trillion to the global economy annually by this year — if we act now.