Dame Lesley Speaks Out

Last month health officials published guidance which sets out the key priorities for NHS trusts which no longer includes a target to roll out women’s health hubs in all parts of the country.

Speaking to The Daily Telegraph, Dame Lesley urged Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, to think again. She suggested that the ministers and health officials were in danger of forgetting about women, despite the fact they constitute 51 per cent of the population.

“There already is a men’s health strategy: it’s called the NHS; it’s already designed by men for men,” said Dame Lesley.

She is worried that menopause and osteoporosis services will be specially affected. “It would be very disappointing if the NHS abandoned the target. We can’t afford not to do it.”

Dame Lesley was appointed as the first-ever Women’s Health Ambassador by the previous Conservative Government in 2022. Alongside that role, she continues her clinical practice at Imperial College Healthcare and as Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Imperial College London, bringing expertise that spans a 42 year career in women’s health, with a particular interest in miscarriage, period problems, gynaecological surgery and menopause.

Alongside her academic and clinical roles, Professor Regan is also Honorary Secretary of the International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) and the Immediate Past President (2016-2019) of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, only the second woman to ever hold this role and the first in sixty-four years.