Rapid development of women’s health in Middle East

The change is being driven by various factors including an aging population, urbanisation, lifestyle changes, and a heightened awareness of overall wellbeing. This is creating change in women’s health technologies and national policies but highlights the investment challenges faced by female health start-ups and female-led companies.

Growing demand for healthcare solutions

The biotech and pharma industries in the Middle East are generally experiencing growth, driven partly by increasing demand for healthcare solutions, particularly for prevalent conditions in the region like obesity, heart disease, and chronic illness. This echoes the general global shift seen since the Covid-19 pandemic towards overall wellbeing, further amplified by a move towards preventative measures and a greater emphasis on self-care and education.

While there has historically been a lack of region-focused market research and data, there are now more opportunities for investment into healthcare across the Middle East as the market continues to grow.

Women’s health gap

Despite advancements in medical technology and treatment globally, there continues to be a gap in women’s health – with regard to both availability of products and services and investment opportunities. According to Omnia Health research, there is a loss of an estimated 75 million years of life per year due to poor health or premature death.

Research into women’s health has been chronically underfunded, leading to inequities in diagnosis, treatment, and access to healthcare. According to the United Nations Population Fund, women are often excluded from clinical trials, resulting in delayed diagnostics and treatment. In more than 700 diseases, women’s diagnostics are delayed on average by four years longer than for men, and for every woman diagnosed with a women’s health-related condition, approximately four go undiagnosed.

Women in the Middle East face unique healthcare challenges, including a lack of representation in the healthcare sector, specific female disease risk factors, and a tendency to neglect their health in favour of caring for others. Reproductive health issues are also a significant concern.

Allocating investment to bridge the gap could add US$ 1 trillion to the global economy by 2040 but this, of course, requires efforts from policy makers, healthcare providers, innovators and start-ups combined.

New developments, opportunities and policy reform

Several policy reforms and government initiatives have been implemented to address these challenges in recent years, with plans to further the women’s health movement in the near future.

For instance, the UAE’s National Policy for the Promotion of Women’s Health, launched in 2024, aims to reduce cancer deaths and overall female mortality, cut medical issues from obesity, and reinform innovation and research capacity in women’s health by the use of data and promoting and researching initiatives and interventions. It builds on the UAE National Strategy for Empowerment of Emirati Women which also focuses on providing healthcare services to enhance physical and psychological health and ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health.

Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 also emphasises advancements in women's health, through initiation of its Healthcare Transformation Program to create a universal and integrated healthcare system, key initiatives of which include free breast cancer screening for women over the age of 40.

On a related note, government spending and private sector investment has also increased in recent years, in turn generating more opportunities. In January 2024, the DFM-listed Dubai Investments further added to its healthcare interests, with a 34.3% stake purchase in Global Fertility Partners (GFP). GFP has a network of fertility and reproductive genetics centres in the Middle East. The initial focus is on Saudi Arabia, where the network will “deliver multiple benefits for patients including the introduction of new technologies, faster and on a larger scale”. The network also aims to bring treatment costs down, with the GFP flagship facility in Riyadh currently under construction.

Other examples include the Abu Dhabi Department of Health’s agreement with AstraZeneca and M42 to develop the UAE’s first breast cancer quality improvement programme and research platform. M42 has also launched its Laha Wellness Hub, a women’s health clinic for menopause, endometriosis and fertility. These partnerships aim to address the specific needs of women, which are often neglected, with emphasis on supporting women to continue their careers as key members of the workforce.

Easier accessibly of women’s health services is also a key topic, with private sector companies noting patients’ preferences for conveniently located clinics and health centres. One particularly innovative example was Ovasave’s “Fertility Your Way” campaign, which saw free fertility testing buses travel across key communities in the UAE to offer thousands of women free fertility testing services and fertility education in an easily accessible way.

A note on technology

In parallel to the increased activity in healthcare services, the Middle East is also seeing a surge in technological and digital innovations generally, with machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) innovation a major focus. In the current situation where female health is understudied in relation to men’s health, and tech and digital talent is being actively nurtured in the Middle East, this presents opportunities to use machine learning and AI to analyse data and look for other risk factors that can improve diagnostic accuracy for women and different categories of patients.

Investment challenges

Despite the growth in the ‘femtech’ industry – which is projected to reach $3.8 billion by 2031 in the UAE alone – and the levels of investment seen from government departments and the major pharmaceutical companies, there continue to be significant investment challenges relating to women’s health for SME private companies and start-ups.

Most investment is male-led, and there is a lack of funding for female-led startups, with less than 1% of start-up funding across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region allocated to female-founded start-ups, according to Omnia Health. Women are in a preferential position to be able to identify, research, develop and improve female healthcare options, though they represent a small portion of investors, particularly in the MENA region. There has been a general rise in female investors in recent years – however, gender bias against female entrepreneurs, assumptions of lack of financial literacy and the traditional lack of understanding of women's health needs pose additional challenges which must be overcome during this pivot towards improving female health.

Challenges aside, there are signs that the world of funding and investment is becoming more inclusive with more exposure for influential women in MENA and, in the UAE, requirements that public and private joint-stock companies have at least one female board member.

Initiatives such as the Women’s Economic Empowerment programme, launched by the General Women’s Union of the UAE, aims to equip Emirati women with skills in various sectors including entrepreneurship, which may empower more female investors generally. Similarly, the Women's Health Accelerator Program, launched by Organon and Flat6Labs, aims to address investment challenges by financing and guiding digital health startups focused on women's health across MENA and Turkey. The program's second cycle will nurture 15 promising startups in family planning, fertility planning, and women's wellness.

While government initiatives have kick-started a women’s health revolution in the region, backed-up by government partnerships with Big Pharma and large healthcare institutions to implement change. However, the investment environment for SMEs and start-ups is more challenging, with a lack of female investors and understanding of women’s health issues. Continuing to educate on the value of women’s health solutions and nurturing female-led investment could be the catalyst needed to tap the full value of this market.