Belgium’s Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke will commission a study into sex differences in medication from the Federal Centre of Expertise for Healthcare.
The announcement was made on Monday evening at the conclusion of a campaign by Rebelle vzw, a women’s organisation that advocates for gender equality in healthcare. The organisation had presented an open letter with 3,542 signatures along with a symbolic giant “Rebelline” medicine box, which last year contained colourful fruit sweets to highlight the lack of representation of women in medical research.
The letter called for additional structural funding for research into sex and gender-specific medication, gender-sensitive training for healthcare professionals, tailored treatment guidelines for women’s bodies, and stricter enforcement and strengthening of European regulations on clinical trials.
Vandenbroucke expressed commitment to addressing these issues and pledged not to let the matter fall by the wayside within the federal government. He stated, “The simple answer is ‘yes.’ But this will happen in steps. As a first step, I will commission a literature study through the KCE to assess what we do and don’t know about sex differences in medication. Recommendations will follow, paving the way for further action. This approach could position us as a European pioneer in sex-specific pharmacotherapy, promoting innovative, patient-focused, and high-quality policies.”
Statistics show that women experience 50-60% more side effects from medications than men. Conditions like endometriosis and polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) remain significantly under-researched. Rebelle vzw attributes this to decades of underrepresentation of women in clinical studies, insufficient knowledge about conditions affecting women exclusively or predominantly, and gender-biased stereotypes influencing healthcare practices.
