Healthcare Access

The Opportunity

Companies that design health benefits around what employees actually need, rather than what a standard plan happens to cover, see higher utilization, stronger retention among experienced employees, and a meaningful signal to the market that they take care of their people. Women's health coverage is one of the clearest places where that signal lands.

The Business Case

The Mayo Clinic estimates that menopause-related productivity losses cost U.S. employers $1.8 billion annually in missed workdays alone. Related healthcare costs exceed $24 billion per year.⁴ One in ten women has declined a job offer because the employer did not offer adequate menopause support.⁵ McKinsey and the World Economic Forum project that closing the women's health gap could add at least $1 trillion to the global economy annually by 2040.⁶

Comprehensive women's health coverage is not a cost center. It is a retention strategy for the employees who are often most difficult and most expensive to replace.

What the Research Shows

Women spend nearly 30 percent more out of pocket on healthcare than men. In 2024, that gap totaled $8.8 billion.¹ Only 40 percent of employers currently offer fertility benefits, despite fertility challenges affecting one in eight couples.² Only 15 to 29 percent of organizations offer any menopause-specific support, despite menopause affecting every woman who lives long enough to experience it.³

Menopause typically arrives between ages 45 and 55, when many women are at the peak of their professional influence. Symptoms including cognitive fog, disrupted sleep, anxiety, and fatigue have measurable impact on performance and attendance. These are not personal problems. They are workforce planning issues that respond directly to policy design.

A Note on the Coverage Gap

Traditional insurance plans, whether HMO or PPO, were not designed around women's health needs at midlife. Many of the most effective interventions for menopause, perimenopause, and hormone-related conditions are available through specialized women-centered telehealth platforms that fall outside what a standard plan covers. Organizations that provide a flexible wellness stipend usable on these platforms address this gap practically and affordably. Companies that do this earn the benefit of both Pillar 2 and Pillar 5 working together.

What Good Looks Like

Good represents accessible baseline practices. Better reflects more intentional investment. Best describes what the most forward-thinking companies are doing right now.

Questions Worth Asking

• Does our health plan cover fertility treatment, HRT, and menopause-related care?
• Do employees know what their plan covers without having to decode a benefits document?
• Are there women's health needs in our workforce that our current plan does not address?
• Do we offer any flexible wellness benefit that employees can use on platforms outside our standard plan?
• When did we last review our health benefits through the lens of what women in our workforce actually need?