What the New Executive Order Means for Women’s Health Funding

Noninvasive, painless methods for diagnosing endometriosis. Wearables to ensure a safer delivery for both mother and baby. Objective biomarkers for chronic pain. These are a few of the projects aimed at improving women’s health that are already receiving federal investment through Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H).

The October 19 Executive Order (EO), Advancing Women’s Health to Improve Outcomes in All Phases of Life, gives that work a new policy framework to grow into. It directs the creation of a Women’s Health Division within the The National Institutes of Health (NIH), establishes a White House Women’s Health Task Force, and prioritizes translating research into evidence-based prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and care throughout women’s lives.

The question for innovators is how quickly, and in what form, this direction will shape agency programs and funding.

What the Executive Order Says

The order establishes a new federal structure for women’s health research and its translation into care. Four changes stand out:

1. Establishing a new NIH Women’s Health Division: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is directed to establish the division within 90 days. Working with the NIH’s Office of Research on Women’s Health, it will coordinate research, advance technologies that shorten diagnosis time, and strengthen interdisciplinary collaboration.
2. Creating a White House Women’s Health Task Force: Its membership includes NIH, ARPA-H, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), bringing research, regulatory, public health, and coverage perspectives into one coordinated framework.
3. Improving women’s health by first understanding it better: The order highlights that the health needs of women and girls evolve across the lifespan, from infancy and adolescence through pregnancy, perimenopause, menopause, and aging. It also emphasizes the importance of increased research on the less studied and poorly understood health conditions that impact women throughout these phases and calls for the Division to support the increased inclusion of women and girls in clinical trials.
4. Emphasizing the importance of moving from evidence into real practice: The Task Force’s responsibilities include adoption, implementation, clinical education, and coordination across care settings, pilot programs, public-private partnerships, and community and public health programs.

The order also replaces earlier executive actions, revoking the March 2024 EO on Advancing Women’s Health Research and Innovation and the November 2023 Presidential Memorandum announcing the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research.

The Funding Picture

Although the order does not establish a quantified research funding pool, it sets priorities that could shape future agency investments. Implementation remains subject to available appropriations.

In a recent CBS Mornings interview, ARPA-H Director Alicia Jackson, a member of the Task Force, discussed forthcoming efforts at the $100 million to $200 million scale. Though not a confirmed funding total, her remarks point to potential investments in the near future.

Innovators can prepare now by assessing how their capabilities align with these policy priorities, while waiting for specific announcements to establish technical requirements, budgets, and submission details. Existing investments are the best available preview for what could come next.

ARPA-H’s $113 Million Portfolio as a Starting Point

ARPA-H’s Sprint for Women’s Health reports $113 million invested across 24 awardees through its Spark (early-stage research) and Launchpad (later-stage development) tracks. Its six topics show the breadth of technologies the agency is pursuing:

• At-home care: Diagnostics and treatments that expand access outside traditional clinical settings, including infection detection and maternal monitoring
• Ovarian health: Therapeutics and technologies to preserve ovarian function, maintain endocrine function, and address longer-term effects of menopause
• Female-specific research models (ARTEMIS): Platforms that better represent female physiology, including reproductive biology, hormonal fluctuations, and genetic/epigenetic differences
• Brain health: Technologies focused on the brain’s lymphatic and glymphatic systems to study, diagnose, and treat neurological conditions
• Chronic pain measurement: Objective, quantitative tools to distinguish pain types, track changes over time, and evaluate treatment responses
• Other breakthroughs: A broader topic supporting new research methods, technologies, and interdisciplinary approaches

The broader ARPA-H portfolio offers additional examples. Program Manager Kimberley E. Steele, MD, PhD, leads the Sprint’s Women’s Brain Health topic as well as GLIDE and LIGHT, programs addressing therapeutics and diagnostics for the lymphatic system, which has important sex differences. Program Manager Kate C Arnold, MD, MBA, leads Making Obstetrics Care Smart (MOCS), focused on placental health and fetal monitoring.

Across these efforts, a recurring objective is to produce evidence that can inform a confident and timely decision: identifying risk sooner, representing female biology more accurately, or helping clinicians determine when and how to intervene.

Three Investment Priorities Worth Watching

1. Earlier Answers, Closer to the Patient: At-home diagnostics and treatments are prominent in the ARPA-H Sprint portfolio, from preeclampsia testing to HPV detection and management. The EO similarly emphasizes earlier identification of health risks and timely, stage-specific care. For innovators, the convenience of an at-home diagnostic alone won’t carry a proposal. Instead, show how an earlier answer leads to a different clinical decision or patient action, and how that improves outcomes.
2. Female Biology as a Design Requirement: The Sprint’s ARTEMIS topic, helmed by Program Manager Daria Fedyukina, PhD, supports research models that account for female physiology, counteracting a historical focus on male research models. This is aligned with the EO’s promotion of methodologies that will enable a better understanding of sex differences in health outcomes. A strong proposal identifies a specific limitation in existing evidence or methods and explains how addressing it would improve research, product development, and clinical decisions.
3. Measurable Function and Long-Term Health: The EO spans cardiovascular disease, neurological disorders, autoimmune and inflammatory conditions, menopause, chronic pain, and aging. Existing ARPA-H investments in pain management, brain imaging, and neurological interventions suggest an interest in innovative research that informs action. Does your proposed innovation tell a clinician when to intervene, or whether a treatment is working? Tools, technologies, and platforms that do are better positioned to stand out.

Building Your Plan Before the Next Announcement

Existing awards show how agencies are already pursuing these goals. Future announcements will show where the money and fine print land. Innovators can use this time to define the clinical problem and build a plan that addresses:

• The patient population and life stage
• Current limitations in research methods, diagnosis, or treatment
• Evidence needed to demonstrate improvement over current practice
• Regulatory, clinical, manufacturing and implementation requirements
• Milestones and costs for reaching the next development stage

Relevance to women’s health and fit with the EO’s priorities are the starting point. The strongest proposals pair it with a defined scope of work, measurable outcomes, and a clear path to the agency that can fund it.