The Trillion Dollar Opportunity
During an event at LATechWeek, one of the speakers echoed a sentiment we’ve been hearing a lot lately: The momentum in the FemTech and women’s health spaces are finally reaching a point where they’re no longer seen as niche. That sounds innocuous enough, until it really starts to sink in. Can it really be that as long as businesses have been around, it is only recently that businesses created for addressing the health of 50% (!!!) of the population—the part of the population who is acknowledged to have incredible spending power and financial decision-making within and outside of the home—are just NOW no longer being considered “niche”? How is half the population niche?
The sad truth is that women, especially when viewed through the global lens, are still treated as second class citizens. Even the areas that are quintessentially “women”—female reproductive health, pregnancy, and childbirth—only receive about 2% of medical research funding globally, according to a Jan 2024 World Economic Forum (WEF) and McKinsey Health Institute report. The United States’s National Institutes of Health allocated about 10.8% of its budget in 2020 to researching areas of women’s health. Outside of gender- or sex-specific (aka women’s health or men’s health) research, women have been and continue to be left out of research studies, in general, which creates and continues to exacerbate a data disparity across health, conditions, and health outcomes. According to the WEF report, “for every one woman diagnosed with a health condition, roughly four go undiagnosed,” further underscoring the lack of visibility and care. In working to solve these problems (with any amount of speed), we tend to look to startups for innovation and speed-to-market. Of the healthcare companies that received VC funding in 2023, a mere 2% of those companies were focused on women’s health—the majority of those companies focusing on reproductive health.
The alarming gap in healthcare represents a staggering TRILLION-dollar annual boost to the global economy by 2040, according to the WEF report. A trillion-dollar opportunity doesn’t say niche; it says underserved. Women’s sexual, reproductive and maternal health constitutes 5% of women’s health burden—FIVE percent—leaving 95% of women’s health burden as both opportunity and important problems-to-solve. Women wield more spending power in the home, making more of the shopping and financial decisions within the home. Women decide which doctors they and their partner and/or kids should see, what vehicles are purchased, which groceries go in the cart, which service providers are used—from dry cleaners to salons, childcare, dance schools, karate studios, gyms, summer camps, home services, insurance plans, and so on. Women outlive men. The power of our dollar and our ability to make financial decisions will literally circulate and resonate for longer.
Further, women are choosing more and more to delay, or completely forego, marriage and/or children. These women, especially, tend to have more disposable income. They are more willing and more likely to pay out of pocket for healthcare services to meet their needs. Yet, those healthcare companies, and healthcare providers, may not be accessible to them or may only focus on that 5% of women’s healthcare–reproductive, sexual and maternal health—that may not represent their specific health needs. Women are at higher risk of stress and burnout, heart disease, cancer, stroke, chronic lower respiratory disease, Alzheimer disease, diabetes, urinary tract infections, HPV, and osteoporosis. While reproductive, sexual and maternal health are incredibly important, women’s health—and the 95% of our health burden—encompasses so much more.
The tide is turning. 2040 is a mere 16 (almost 15) years away. To bridge these healthcare gaps and not let a trillion dollars of annual global economic growth slip through our collective societal fingers, we need to make concerted efforts every day. We need to collectively agree that the health and safety of women is 1) a fundamental right, not a privilege, 2) a priority, and 3) apolitical/non-partisan (a hot take, we know!). We need allies in men; we need partnerships that stretch across ideology and rhetoric. We need funding from women (and men) investors for businesses created by women for women.
To all of you amazing women out there: You wield enormous power with every dollar you choose to spend; invest (yes, your money, and also your time and energy) in women and lead the way in helping create that trillion-dollar annual economic opportunity.
Referenced articles and sites:
World Economic Formum and McKinsey Health Institute Report https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Closing_the_Women%E2%80%99s_Health_Gap_2024.pdf
Perspectives From Advancing National Institutes of Health Research to Inform and Improve the Health of Women. A Conference Summary. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9205296/#:~:text=6-,Research%20on%20Women's%20Health,year%202020%20($4%2C466%20million).&text=As%20shown%20in%20Figure%201,and%2025%25%2C%20respectively).
VC funding in women’s health ‘on the uprise’ in 2023 https://www.healthcare-brew.com/stories/2024/02/27/vc-funding-in-women-s-health-on-the-uprise-in-2023
Disparities and the Leading Causes of Death in Women - National Women's Health Week 2023 https://www.womenshealth.gov/node/1374#:~:text=%234%20%E2%80%93%20Chronic%20Lower%20Respiratory%20Disease,men%20every%20year%20since%202000.&text=There%20are%20many%20Tips%20and,a%20Quit%20Smoking%20Coach%20Today!
9 Health Issues Every Woman Should Understand. Manage Your Risk. https://www.nm.org/healthbeat/healthy-tips/9-health-issues-every-woman-should-understand
