By Trevor Hunnicutt and Ahmed Aboulenein
WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (Reuters) - US President Donald Trump signed an executive order alongside first lady Melania Trump on Monday creating a White House task force and a National Institutes of Health division focused on women's health.
The task force will be led by White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, who recently announced that she is cancer-free, and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump said at a White House event.
It directs the federal government
to pursue a comprehensive approach to women's health across all life stages, strengthening research to speed up prevention, diagnosis, and treatment and translating those findings into clinical practice and policy, according to a White House fact sheet.
The task force will hold its first meeting on Monday, Trump said, during what he noted was Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Wiles recently finished treatment for breast cancer.
"The executive order I'll sign in just a moment will direct the Department of Health and Human Services to establish a new women's health division within the National Institute of Health," Trump said at the event.
"That's a big deal. They've been after it for a long time," he said. "Who the hell wouldn't have a woman's health division? Melania said they don't have it."
The NIH has an Office of Research on Women's Health, established in 1990.
The new division will operate in coordination with that office rather than replace it, and must be established within an appropriate NIH institute or center within 90 days, according to the order. The White House said the move is meant to broaden the government's focus beyond research and prioritize translating discoveries into clinical care for women and girls.
It will focus on speeding up diagnosis and improving treatment of women's health conditions that remain understudied, boosting the inclusion of women and girls in clinical trials, and holding grant recipients accountable for considering sex as a biological variable.
CONDITIONS AFFECTING WOMEN DISPROPORTIONATELY
The division will study conditions that uniquely or disproportionately affect women, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, autoimmune and inflammatory conditions, chronic pain, endometriosis, fibroids, polyendocrine metabolic ovary syndrome, infertility, menopause, Alzheimer's disease and osteoporosis, the Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement.
The order was first reported by USA Today.
Melania Trump, whom Trump credited with conceiving the initiative, said the effort should "ensure that medical breakthroughs are accessible and affordable to women, regardless of their financial circumstances" and "replace generations of silence with open conversation, education and compassion."
Trump and his administration have pushed for healthcare cuts, including at NIH, and last year moved to downsize the federal healthcare workforce.
During Trump's second term, his administration sought to cut NIH grants for research on diversity-related topics and reportedly is moving to allow political appointees to control health-research funding.
The order revokes former President Joe Biden's March 2024 executive order on advancing women's health research, which was championed by then-first lady Jill Biden, as well as a November 2023 memorandum that created a White House initiative on the issue.
The Trump administration has also launched a safety review of the abortion pill, mifepristone, that could pave the way for restrictions. Major medical groups have criticized the move as politically motivated while anti-abortion groups argue the review is moving too slowly. Earlier this month, US officials told a court the review would be completed by March.
US health officials also removed a longstanding safety warning from many hormone replacement therapy products, tightening supplies and leading to shortages, and have urged more manufacturers to study testosterone therapies for women that could support future approvals of female-specific products.
HHS has also targeted family planning funds, announcing earlier this year that for the first time it would require applicants for Title X funding to align their programs with Trump's political priorities, prompting legal action.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Ahmed Aboulenein; Additional reporting by Susan Heavey; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Bill Berkrot and Deepa Babington)
