On April 23, the Women’s Health Initiative learned that contracts for its regional offices will be terminated in September. The headquarters will shut down in January 2026.
Nicholas Corral spoke with Marlena Fejzo, an assistant professor at the Keck School who spoke at the White House Conference on Women’s Health Research in December
Corral: Why was the Women’s Health Initiative significant?
Fejzo: Well, there are many different conditions and diseases of women that are still in the dark ages, with respect to what causes them, respect to therapies for them, and so the Women’s Health Initiative really brought that to light or began to bring that to light and make progress for those conditions. But we have a long way to go.
Corral: What would the impact be on researchers in the day to day?
Fejzo: Researchers have to go where the money is, so they’re not going to be focusing on these conditions and diseases anymore. They’re going to go back to the same old, same old. So it’s really disappointing.
Corral: How did the research that was being done by this initiative, how did it play a role in what happened at USC? What kind of research is being done here?
Fejzo: It spurred efforts to focus on other conditions that affect women, rather than just conditions that affect men. So like I said, people go where the money is. So when there’s interest and funding available to to support women’s health, then people are going to work on women’s health. If there’s no funding, you can’t just do work for no pay. I mean, I do that, but other people who are not as personally motivated do not. So it’s it’s really going to hamper the progress or stop the progress once again.
Corral: I wonder if you could tell me a little bit about what kind of research is happening at USC around women’s health, you know both yourself and your colleagues.
Fejzo: I work on severe nausea and vomiting of pregnancy. We have a researcher that works on breast milk and breastfeeding. There are many different studies ongoing at USC that involved, that involve women’s health, policy for women and other marginalized groups that are now being severely impacted.
Corral: I saw you were just at the White House. How are you feeling, having been there just few months ago to today?
Fejzo: It was a really exciting time. Although we knew that there was going to be a change, we didn’t realize it was going to happen this fast and this abruptly and this extremely but at least we know that some of our country has some momentum in this area, and hopefully we can just turn to the private sector to help support these women’s causes. And I think that that interest is still there, and people are more aware of the need, people in high places. So I hope that we will be able to continue some of the work at least.
Corral: What happens next in terms of how do you go about getting that private funding, and is there any chance you think that we see a reversal of these cuts?
Fejzo: I don’t think there’s going to be a reversal. I’m not optimistic about that, I guess, but I do see the private sector turning up the volume in this area. I work for a new foundation, the Foundation for Women’s Health, and they’ve been very successful in raising funds, and we’ve been working really hard to get grants out. This year we gave out grants for women’s health research specifically, and will continue to do so, so hopefully there will be more momentum from the private sector to fill the gaps.
Corral: And then is there anything we didn’t talk about that you want to say?
Fejzo: Just it’s really disappointing that women’s health was finally coming out of the dark ages, and now we’re getting kicked back in and you know these people that are making these decisions, some of them are women, some of them are husbands of women, or fathers of women or sons of women, and so it just seems really short sighted, And I hope that the women around them can stand up and scream and tell them that this is really wrong and it’s going to affect them too.