Panel discussion with Dr. Wendy Cukier and Dr. Glenys Webster at the Femtech Canada Forum in Montreal
“Incorporating sex and gender into science doesn’t just improve equity—it makes the science better,” said Dr. Glenys Webster, Associate Director at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Institute of Gender and Health.
That message set the tone for a candid and powerful discussion hosted by Femtech Canada during the Femtech Canada Forum. Moderated by Sarah Howe, COO of St. Joe’s Research Institute, the panel featured two of Canada’s foremost leaders in gender health and innovation: Dr. Glenys Webster, and Dr. Wendy Cukier, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU).
Together, they explored the systemic forces that continue to shape women’s health outcomes—and challenged attendees to think bigger about the role research, policy, and equity play in building stronger, healthier communities.
Watch the full conversation below or read our key takeaways.
Investment in women’s health research
Dr. Webster offered an inside look at the National Women’s Health Research Initiative (NWHRI)—a $26.5 million federal program co-led by CIHR and Women and Gender Equality Canada (WAGE). Launched in 2021, it represents the first major funding commitment for women’s health research in Canada in more than a generation.
The initiative has two core arms. The first, the Pan-Canadian Women’s Health Coalition, includes ten research hubs across the country and a coordinating centre. Their role: get research out of the lab and into the hands of people who need it—clinicians, decision-makers, and the general public.
The second arm, the Innovation Fund, provides grants for high-impact projects in historically underfunded areas. Webster noted that in just the last round, 24 research teams received funding to tackle translational challenges—from new diagnostics to care delivery models.
Three of those projects focused on endometriosis—a condition affecting an estimated 1 in 10 women worldwide, often undiagnosed for years. These studies aim to improve screening, identify non-invasive ways to reduce pain, and better understand disease progression.
“We saw incredible applications come forward—but we couldn’t fund them all,” said Webster. “That shows just how much talent and opportunity we’re still leaving on the table.”
What makes NWHRI especially significant is its inclusive lens. Projects are funded not only based on clinical merit, but on their potential to benefit cisgender women, trans individuals, non-binary people, and other gender-diverse communities often excluded from mainstream health research.
Systemic restructure to boost the impact of women entrepreneurs
Dr. Wendy Cukier, Founder of the Diversity Institute at TMU, brought the conversation back to innovation systems—and the persistent structural barriers faced by women, Indigenous founders and equity-deserving entrepreneurs.
“We need an entrepreneurship ecosystem that levels the playing field. Women need fair access to capital,” said Cukier. “We’ve built systems around a narrow definition of innovation, and it’s excluded a lot of people.”
Drawing from her experience leading the Women Entrepreneurship Knowledge Hub (WEKH) and supporting accelerators and incubators across Canada, Cukier described how male-dominated startup culture has historically made women feel out of place. We need to look at how we think about innovation which is often narrowly defined in ways that exclude women and entrepreneurship. Changing this affects where investments are made and how organizations operate. “Even when women get in, they often don’t feel supported.”
Cukier challenged the tendency to focus on “fixing” women, calling instead for systems-level change: rethinking procurement, funding models, and the very definition of innovation itself. “Search ‘entrepreneur’ on Google,” she noted. “You’ll see mostly white men. Really, we have to fix the gatekeepers. We have to challenge the biases that are embedded in a lot of the systems, from top to bottom.”
Tackling bias in scientific progress
Since 2010, CIHR has made sex and gender considerations a mandatory part of project grant applications. Researchers must now justify how these factors are—or are not—being considered, and peer reviewers are trained to assess their inclusion.
“Researchers who include sex and gender are getting higher scores and better funding outcomes,” said Webster. “It’s opening doors to discoveries we would have missed otherwise.”
She pointed to one of the most compelling examples: a pain researcher who uncovered that the physiology of chronic pain differs between male and female mice—a finding that has reshaped the field and led to new lines of inquiry around sex-based treatment responses in humans.
Despite this progress, Webster emphasized that more needs to be done to ensure research outputs are disaggregated by sex and gender—not just considered at the proposal stage. CIHR is now revisiting its training modules and continuing to push for accountability across the ecosystem.
The trillion-dollar opportunity no one’s talking about
Throughout the discussion, both speakers stressed that advancing women’s health isn’t just a social priority—it’s an economic one.
“Eighty percent of women entrepreneurs in Canada are self-employed. Yet most funding is directed at traditional SMEs with employees,” said Cukier. “We’re missing a huge part of the market.”
Cukier contrasted this with massive public investments in industries like automotive and theoretical physics—areas where the cost-per-job can reach into the millions. “Meanwhile, a $10 million investment in women entrepreneurs created 1,000 jobs—and every single venture contributed to the Sustainable Development Goals.”
Webster agreed, adding that closing the global women’s health gap is a $1 trillion opportunity. “So no matter how you look at it—equity, compassion, or economy—there’s no excuse not to act.”
What’s next?
As the panel wrapped up, it became clear that the path forward is about more than increasing funding. It’s about fundamentally reshaping how we define, support, and scale innovation.
“We need more than women-only programs,” said Cukier. “We need an ecosystem where women, racialized folks, LGBTQ2S+ individuals, and others aren’t just accommodated—they’re expected and empowered.”
The panelists emphasized that intersectionality must guide every step—from basic research and clinical trials to entrepreneurship, policy, and public health. Only then can we ensure women’s health is no longer sidelined, but fully integrated into Canada’s innovation agenda.
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