Reshaping research and development through women’s leadership

Abstract

To achieve equitable health systems women need to be the architects of innovation, not merely its recipients Across the world, women are the foundation of health systems. They serve as caregivers, nurses, frontline responders, and trusted community leaders. In Africa, this reality is even more pronounced. Women provide up to 75% of unpaid care and make up nearly 70% of the health and social workforce in many countries.1 Yet despite this central role in delivering care, women are largely excluded from the upstream processes that shape the health system. Women are strikingly under-represented in leadership and decision making roles in research and development and prioritisation of health funding, including in research institutions, regulatory agencies, national ethics committees, and ministries of health. As a result, the people most engaged in delivering health solutions are often absent from decisions about their design. Closing this leadership gap is a matter of equity as well as strategic necessity. Without women’s leadership, there is potential for bias in understanding and addressing the health needs of half the population, ranging from drug dosing protocols that ignore female physiology to diagnostic tools that overlook symptoms …