Improving Women’s Health
A woman in India (Photo credit: Pam Traveler, Pexels)
Women’s health has long been overlooked, despite the distinctive health challenges that women face over their lifetimes. Adduna Health Partners provided advisory and consulting support to the Gates Foundation to advance women’s health and address existing global inequities.
According to the 2021 Global Burden of Disease, women experience different health outcomes and higher degrees of morbidity throughout their lifetimes, which are generally longer than for males. Despite these differences, funding for health issues that disproportionately affect women remains woefully inadequate. McKinsey Health Institute estimates that addressing this health gap would not only improve women's health outcomes but also boost the global economy by at least $1 trillion annually by 2040.
The Gates Foundation centers women’s health as one of its priorities, focusing on conditions that disproportionately affect women in low- and middle-income countries. In 2024, its Program Advocacy and Communications team invited Adduna Health Partners to expand their capacity, explore key questions, and accelerate the progress of their expansive portfolio— which includes family planning, women’s health innovations, primary health care, and maternal, newborn, and child health, and nutrition. Over a six-month period, the Adduna team developed innovative analyses and generated novel insights that support women’s health.
The Adduna team contributions included: a new strategy to promote the effective use of women’s health champions, guidance on novel approaches to promote greater access to women’s health commodities, recommendations to influence innovative interventions in novel areas, including, among others, the critical role of venture capital in women’s health research and development and the potential of the fashion industry to advocate for and increase investments in women’s health, and tailored maternal and child health resource mobilization plans. Adduna Health Partners also analyzed the team’s investment portfolio, making recommendations about gaps and potential areas of overlap.
The Gates Foundation aims to mitigate high maternal, neonatal, and infant mortality affecting many low-income communities by making investments that improve health and increase access to family planning, primary health care services, and lifesaving innovations.
By contributing its technical expertise, skills, and passion to support clients like the Gates Foundation, Adduna Health Partners remains committed to moving the needle on women’s health worldwide.