Sex-bias in healthcare and research has long been a prevalent issue for women, as clinical trials occurring as recently as 2023 have excluded women, in favour of testing men as “the average person”.

This has had consequences such as women being more likely to experience negative side effects to certain drugs, due to important differences in female bodies being unaccounted for in research.

As today is the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, producer Athena spoke to Associate Professor, Dr Kelly Burrowes, at the University of Auckland Bioengineering Institute, about the historic and current gender inequities in healthcare and clinical research, as well as The FemTech Revolution.