Be sure to read CGR Director Linda Griffith’s article, “‘FemTech’ and a moonshot for menstruation science,” featured in the October 30, 2022 Boston Globe magazine as part of the annual “Women & Power” package.
Griffith discusses the need for more research and funding for women’s health and describes how “…existing studies barely scratch the surface of a possible “health gap,” which encompasses the disparity of how sick women and men get during their productive working years from diseases they are more prone to because of their gender. Delayed diagnoses and lack of effective therapies even for patients with the best access to care can contribute to worse outcomes, and these factors are accentuated for lower-income patients. Endometriosis, like many female-skewed diseases, is not strongly linked to lifestyle factors, such as diet and exercise, giving even the most motivated patients a sense of helplessness.
“How big is this health gap, and how much does it contribute to the wage gap? … About half of women who have hysterectomies get large abdominal incisions, taking weeks to recover. Unsurprisingly, all of this comes at a huge cost to the economy. By age 60, 1 in 3 women in the United States has had a hysterectomy. For endometriosis alone, estimates from the most recent comprehensive study to be done on the issue, would put today’s cost at about $15,000 per patient, with two-thirds of that due to lost productivity. For the 7 million to 8 million US women who have endometriosis, this translates to a loss of roughly $105 billion annually.”
The Globe’s full Women & Power 2022 package is available here.
Join us at MIT or virtually for the next SeXX and Immunity event from 4-7 p.m. ET on Nov. 2, 2022!
