Canada’s universal healthcare system is only built for half the population

Of all the things Canada boasts about, our free and inclusive health care is often the one we use for bragging rights across North America. But peeking behind that convenient health-care curtain, hundreds of thousands of Canadian women are asking the same question: what about us?

Just seven per cent of Canadian health research focuses specifically on women, according to a 2025 University of Toronto and Centre for Addiction and Mental Health study. The IWK Foundation, located just down the road from Dalhousie University, cites that study in their recent women’s health care report — calling for the appointment of a national women’s health chair and a 10-year women’s health investment plan.

The IWK Foundation notes that women’s health care has long been pigeonholed into reproductive care. But even though this is the focus, our reproductive care is still lacking. 

A study by the Fraser Institute found that in 2023, Nova Scotia’s wait time for treatment after a gynecology appointment was 33.6 weeks, longer than anywhere else in Canada by more than 10 weeks. 

If you don’t think women’s health alone warrants a reaction, the Canadian economy loses $3.5 billion a year due to unmanaged symptoms of menopause, according to a report from the Menopause Foundation of Canada. Women in Canada spend 24 per cent more time in poor health compared to men, which could be forcing them to take time off work.

Canada ranks in the bottom five globally in terms of women’s health-related economic gaps, according to the McKinsey Health Institute. It’s embarrassing. 

I’ve had my fair share of health-care shocks as a woman in Canada. When I was looking into a common reproductive health procedure, I was happy to learn it would be performed free of charge. 

Imagine my shock when I walked up to the drugstore counter and found out that, although the procedure was free, I’d have to pay over $400 for the instrument itself. I paid and left upset and confused, but I didn’t ask any questions — because what could I do?

Nearly everything in women’s health care is whispered and hushed, and we are expected to continue in silence without pushback.

The IWK is urging Canada to broaden its focus past this “bikini medicine” and see women as more than the sum of their parts (literally). There is still a lot of work to be done, but Dalhousie is taking steps in the right direction. 

In March 2025, the faculty of medicine launched a “Girls Just Wanna Have Funding” campaign, aiming to ensure female-led medicine isn’t hindered by gaps in funding. In June 2025, Keisha Jefferies, an assistant professor at Dalhousie’s nursing school, received funding to pursue mental-health research projects advancing Black women’s health outcomes.

Although these grants and research are great, the root of this problem runs deeper. 

The Canadian Institute of Health Research still doesn’t have a review panel for women’s health. As I learned in a gender and women’s studies course at Dal, women are more likely than men to die in car accidents due to safety features being tested primarily on male anatomies.

We like to rag on the United States for its anti-science descent into traditionalism, bragging that we could never be like them. For example, the United States only made it a federal law that women had to be included in clinical trials in 1993. 

Well, Canada hasn’t done it at all.

The health-care system was not designed with women in mind. It disregards that we are more than just “non-men.” There is a pattern of cutting women off at the knees well before they seek immediate help. 

Heart disease, cancer and autoimmune disorders are all greatly under-researched health issues that are especially harmful to women, killing tens of thousands every year. Sisters, mothers, daughters, nieces and friends could all be saved if more grants and research were devoted to helping them.

The statistics seem grim, but not all hope is lost. If we begin implementing the proper initiatives, Canada can make strides towards bridging the healthcare gap.

If we’re not including women in every step of the conversation, beginning to end, there’s no point in having it.