President Trump has signed an executive order creating a new NIH division and a White House task force focused on women’s health, according to STAT. First lady Melania Trump announced the initiative Monday, saying it marked a shift in how women’s health is approached. The NIH division is to be set up within 90 days and is intended to streamline research into understudied diseases in women, improve diagnostics and treatment, and set a new standard for women’s health. It will not replace the existing Office of Research on Women’s Health, and funding details for the division were not disclosed.
The new White House task force, whose first session was scheduled for Monday, will be led by chief of staff Susie Wiles, who recently completed breast cancer treatment. Members include cabinet secretaries Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Pete Hegseth, acting FDA commissioner Kyle Diamantas, and CDC director Erica Schwartz. The Department of Health and Human Services will cover the task force’s administrative costs. Trump said he had been surprised to learn NIH lacked a women’s health division.
The order comes at a turbulent time for women’s health research. STAT notes that scientists have said their work is endangered by special reviews of grants mentioning “women” and by broader moves to cut funding and remove diversity-related language. Chronic underinvestment has left women at higher risk of adverse drug reactions, undiagnosed stroke, and less effective treatment for chronic pain; research cited in the article also shows women are seven times as likely as men to have a heart condition misdiagnosed or to be sent home during a heart attack.