Biotech women mobilize ahead of midterms

Call on industry, FDA to step up for women impacted by Dobbs decision

A group of prominent biotech women leaders is raising its voice in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, calling on the biopharma industry and FDA to take active measures to mitigate the impact of the restriction to abortion on the health of women nationally and on biopharma employees.

In an Oct. 25 open letter, the Biotech Sisterhood and its allies issue four calls to action, reflecting the view among a broad set of stakeholders that the healthcare industry has the knowledge, ability and responsibility to help protect the healthcare of women put at risk by the court’s controversial June ruling.

Sisterhood co-founder Julia Owens told BioCentury that although the informal group may be best known for conducting peer networking events to build bridges that help women succeed as CEOs and executives, it also has created a task force to “take the lead in speaking out on issues we think are important to our industry and to us as female leaders.”

The letter is timed ahead of the midterm elections, aimed at continuing pressure on lawmakers and voters to counter the consequences of the removal of federal protection for abortion rights, and highlighting the ramifications of the ruling for women’s health beyond abortion. 

The group calls on the biopharma industry to provide financial support and time off to employees who need travel to obtain reproductive healthcare services, and to commit to making accommodations for employees to take time off to vote.

Owens, who is president and CEO of Ananke Therapeutics Inc., said it will be up to individual companies and signatories to determine what types of support are appropriate, particularly given different impacts of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling in different geographies. Likewise, circumstances around voting vary from state to state.

The group also calls on drug companies that manufacture products used for abortion care, miscarriage treatment or prevention of pregnancy to make the medicines as widely accessible as possible. It calls on FDA to work with sponsors to remove unnecessary barriers to access, commending the agency’s efforts to remove the REMS restrictions for mifepristone and to allow contraceptive pills to be sold over-the-counter.

In July, the group issued a letter denouncing the June 24 Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade. Owens described that letter, which was signed only by women, as a “starting point, not the sum of what we want to accomplish.”

She said the new letter was drafted to be “more specific and concrete” in its calls to action. Its signatories include not only women, but “allies who have signed on to the same commitments and message we were seeking to articulate.”

“The issue is much broader than a women’s issue,” Owens said. “It’s a human rights issue, a health issue that’s central to our industry and our industry’s effort to improve human health.

The latest letter has over 230 signatories as of Wednesday afternoon, including CEOs and other executives from biotechs, pharmas, venture firms, banks, law firms and other industry stakeholders.

The Biotech Sisterhood is a group of women CEOs with over 100 members, co-founded by Owens along with Sheila Gujrathi, venture adviser at OrbiMed and former co-founder and CEO of Gossamer Bio Inc. (NASDAQ: GOSS), and Angie You, senior adviser at Frazier Healthcare Partners and former CEO of Amunix Pharmaceuticals Inc.