on the day the death of Gloria Steinem<\/a>, one of the most influential feminist campaigners of the last century, was announced.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n\n ![\"Gloria]()
Gloria Steinem, feminist campaigner, dies aged 92 (Image: Hulton Archive\/Getty Images)\n<\/p>\n
\n Almost half a century ago, Steinem wrote her essay If Men Could Menstruate.\n<\/p>\n
\n It was satire, but its premise was devastatingly simple: what would happen if men had periods and women did not?\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cClearly,\u201d she wrote, menstruation would become \u201can enviable, boast-worthy, masculine event.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n In her imagined world, governments would fund research into period pain. Menstrual products would be free. Doctors would study cramps intensively. Menopause would be celebrated.\n<\/p>\n
\n Her point was if men experienced it, would we tolerate ignorance about it?\n<\/p>\n
\n Nearly 50 years later, the question has aged far better than it should have.\n<\/p>\n
\n READ MORE FROM UNSPUN:\n<\/p>\n
\n But women\u2019s health is about far more than vaginas. Hormones such as oestrogen influence health across the body, including bone health, while menstrual, reproductive and menopausal health are deeply connected to wider physical and mental wellbeing.\n<\/p>\n
\n The deeper problem is that medicine has too often treated male physiology as the default, rather than fully accounting for how sex, hormones and different stages of women\u2019s lives can shape health in distinct ways.\n<\/p>\n
\n A study of medical textbooks used around the world found 58 per cent contained no reference to menopause at all. Another 12 per cent devoted less than a paragraph to it.\n<\/p>\n
\n Periods and the menopause are not niche subjects. Endometriosis is not some obscure medical curiosity. PMDD, pelvic pain, heavy bleeding and the relationship between hormones and mental health are not peripheral topics simply because they disproportionately affect women.\n<\/p>\n
\n Scotland now has plans, pathways, websites and online modules but has that really helped?\n<\/p>\n
\n I will say it again. Only 51 GPs in Scotland have completed that menstrual health course.\n<\/p>\n
\n June Smillie, who leads the Nicola\u2019s Law campaign, called the figure \u201cgenuinely shocking\u201d.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cThis really highlights the gap between the ambitions we have for women\u2019s health in Scotland and what is actually happening on the ground,\u201d she said.\n<\/p>\n
\n The campaign was created in memory of Nicola Thyne, a 36-year-old mother of two whose family says she endured years of severe endometriosis pain and had symptoms dismissed as \u201cbad periods\u201d before she took her own life.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n Nicola\u2019s Law wants standardised, mandatory training so women do not have to endure what Nicola did.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n The Government argues that professional development is the responsibility of clinicians, employers, PSD Scotland, universities, Royal Colleges and regulators.\n<\/p>\n
\n That may explain how the system is structured.\n<\/p>\n
\n It does not answer whether it works.\n<\/p>\n
\n Responsibility spread between everyone has a nasty habit of becoming responsibility owned by no one.\n<\/p>\n
\n PSD Scotland itself holds no policy stating whether its menstrual health module is mandatory, recommended or voluntary. Practitioners are expected to identify their own learning needs.\n<\/p>\n
\n And now we know one result of that approach.\n<\/p>\n
\n Fifty-one GPs.\n<\/p>\n
\n This is not about pretending a single online module could solve decades of neglect in women\u2019s medicine. It is about whether political promises survive contact with reality.\n<\/p>\n
\n What ultimately matters is what happens when a woman sits opposite a healthcare professional and says something is wrong.\n<\/p>\n
\n Does she meet someone equipped to recognise what may be happening with her body? Is her pain taken seriously? Are the connections between hormones, physical symptoms and mental health understood? Or does she begin the familiar journey of returning again and again, looking for someone to join the dots?\n<\/p>\n
\n If ministers believe voluntary provision is enough, then 51 completions demands an explanation.\n<\/p>\n
\n If they regard that as satisfactory, they should say so.\n<\/p>\n
\n If they do not, they need to explain what exactly will change.\n<\/p>\n
\n Because women\u2019s health cannot simultaneously be a national priority and everybody else\u2019s responsibility.\n<\/p>\n
\n Steinem imagined a world in which periods would matter if men had them.\n<\/p>\n
\n Nearly half a century later, perhaps the most depressing thing is this message still resonates.\n<\/p>\n
\n Women have spent long enough being the optional chapter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Imagine the world cared about vaginas. Imagine, just for a minute, what difference that might make. Because if…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":759393,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102,2960,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-759392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=759392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/759393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=759392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=759392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=759392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}