Women’s Health Strategy

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Tuesday 9th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, as Minister for Innovation I favour using technology and the latest techniques wherever possible to provide options and choices for all patients, including women, to address their conditions. With women, the delicate question of their bodies, and the different functioning of their bodies to men’s, is one that the health system has to reconcile itself to. I do not regard technology as a panacea to that central challenge; in fact, I think that many of the issues that women face will require face-to-face consultations, and we remain committed to ensuring that that is an option for everyone.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I will not ask the Minister whether he has read Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez—or the medical chapter at least—but, if he has not, I would recommend it. One of the things that it highlights is how many widely and long-used drugs have never been tested for any sex and gender variations in responses. Do the Government have a systematic programme for checking that all drugs have been so appropriately assessed—so that, when the results of this call for evidence are received and acted on, appropriate treatments are available to the newly enlightened medical systems?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I have previously referred to the challenge of gender-comprehensive clinical trials. There is growing evidence that drug prescriptions should be personalised a great deal more than they are, right across the board—not just on a gender basis but on genomic, ethnic, age and weight bases as well. The noble Baroness makes an extremely good point on this. I cannot guarantee that we will retrospectively conduct gender-specific clinical trials on the full library of medicines in the medicine cabinet, but we are keen to aspire to ensuring a future commitment to gender-specific clinical trials going forwards.