A new UK women’s health strategy has launched amid renewed criticism that women’s pain and symptoms are still not taken seriously enough by the NHS. The update comes four years after the first women’s health strategy promised major improvements in how the health system listens to women and girls.
The BBC report centrers on Zoe Trafford from Liverpool, who has lived with endometriosis since her teens. She said doctors long dismissed her symptoms as normal period pain. Since then, she has undergone major surgery, including the removal of her womb and part of her bowel, but says she is still trapped in a cycle of complications and long waits.
Trafford told the BBC she still does not feel heard. She said she is being passed between urology, gynaecology, and her GP without clear answers. Her case is used in the report as an example of a wider complaint: that women are too often left to fight for care rather than receive it promptly.
Government Admits an “Endemic” Problem
Health Secretary Wes Streeting acknowledged the scale of the issue in an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour. He said there is an “endemic problem” in how women’s health conditions are handled in the NHS. He also said some women have been treated like “second class citizens,” with their pain dismissed and their symptoms seen as exaggeration.
Streeting described a culture of medical misogyny and bias within the health system. He said the NHS is “getting disproportionately worse for women” and argued that waiting lists should fall faster for women while access to women’s health services improves.
That language matters because it goes beyond routine policy language. It frames women’s health delays not only as an access problem, but also as a structural bias problem inside care delivery. That is an inference drawn from Streeting’s comments about sexism, bias, and women being treated as an inconvenience.
Waiting Lists Show the Scale of the Pressure
The updated strategy arrives as gynaecology waiting lists remain under severe strain in UK. BBC analysis found that between February 2020 and January 2026, the gynaecology waiting list doubled to more than 565,000 waits to start treatment.
That rise outpaced the increase seen across most other planned NHS treatment. The BBC said waiting lists for other non-mental-health planned care rose too, but by 58%, far less than the growth in gynaecology.
Advocacy groups say those delays carry real health consequences. Emma Cox, chief executive of Endometriosis UK, said diagnosis times of more than nine years for endometriosis are “totally unacceptable.” She said the new commitments must be backed by a clear delivery plan and enough capacity to make change real.
What the New Strategy Promises
Among the new measures is a “patient power payment” scheme, which would let women report their treatment experiences. The government says the feedback would influence funding, with poorer-performing providers at risk of losing money. Gynaecology will be the first area to test the plan.
The strategy also promises a more streamlined referral process to help women reach the right clinicians faster. It includes a new standard of care aimed at ensuring women are offered appropriate pain relief for invasive gynaecological procedures. Streeting also pointed to a digital NHS service due next year, which he said should help speed up more of the patient journey.
Medical groups welcomed the new strategy, but several warned that promises alone will not fix the problem. Dr Alison Wright, president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, said the situation remains deeply concerning with more than 565,000 women still waiting for gynaecological care. Others, including the Royal Osteoporosis Society and Women’s Health Liverpool, said they remain frustrated that earlier ambitions were not matched by enough support or delivery.
The broader message of the UK women’s health strategy is that ministers now openly accept the system is failing many women. The harder question is whether this plan will cut waits, improve pain care, and make patients feel believed in ways the first strategy did not.