Department Chair Attends White House for $12 Billion Women's Health Initiative Executive Order
Date Posted: Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Yesterday department chair Kimberly Yonkers, M.D., attended the signing of President Biden and The First Lady’s historic White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research Executive Order. This $12 billion initiative will establish the Fund for Women’s Health Research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to ensure that women’s health research includes innovative approaches to studying women’s health across their lifespan in a wide range of specialties. The research will work to address disparities in care for mid-life women, those of different ethnicities and veterans.
“Maria Shriver called this ‘a women’s health moonshot,’” Dr. Yonkers said, referring to one of the events’ speakers. “I agree and would add that this could be a game changer for women’s health.”
To accomplish this, the President and the First Lady announced “twenty new actions” with the commitment from many federal agencies including the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Department of Defense (DoD), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the National Science Foundation (NSF), according to their press release.
The order also directs the HSS and the NSF to study ways in which to leverage artificial intelligence to advance women’s health research and expand data collection on health issues that occur after menopause including rheumatoid arthritis, heart attack, as well as osteoporosis.
The National Institutes of Health's expansive effort will be co-chaired by the NIH Office of the Director; the Office of Research on Women’s Health; the National Institute on Aging; the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; the National Institute on Drug Abuse; the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development as well as the National Institute on Arthritis, Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.
Now it’s up to Congress to pass this landmark Executive Order.
To find out more about this bill, visit Women's Health Bill.