Trump Signs Order Launching Women's Health Division at NIH, Championed by Melania

United States President Donald Trump has signed an executive order that will establish a dedicated women's health division within the National Institutes of Health (NIH), as well as a White House task force focused on the subject.

During a signing ceremony in Washington on Monday, First Lady Melania Trump praised the initiative as setting a new standard for women's health in America. She said this is a transformative moment for women in America and that beginning today, the reality of women's health will change.

Melania Trump said previous generations fought for women's rights, while this generation will fight to discover the cures that will ensure a woman can live her life in health and to the fullest.

The project, spearheaded by the first lady, requires the new health division to be established within 90 days. It aims to accelerate scientific discoveries, expand clinical access for women's health and modernise care throughout every stage of a woman's life.

According to the White House, the new division at the NIH will not replace the agency's Office of Research on Women's Health but will have a broader mandate beyond research.

Melania Trump pointed to super intelligence, advanced biotechnology and groundbreaking therapies as tools that offer a unique chance to reinvent women's healthcare.

The first lady's office has identified five pillars for innovation in the field. One involves funding targeted research to develop cures for diseases that affect women, such as endometriosis. Another calls for a quicker timeline for promising therapeutics to reach female patients.

The White House task force will be co-chaired by the newly cancer-free White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, as well as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr.

While Monday's executive order mandates that the HHS must fund the administrative costs of the task force, the order itself does not include any specific funding targets or dollar amounts.

Experts have noted that Melania Trump has kept a relatively low profile during Trump's second term, though she has stepped into the public spotlight to promote improvements to foster care and the role of technology, such as artificial intelligence in education. During Trump's first term, she launched the Be Best campaign focused on child well-being, safe social media and countering opioid abuse.

Critics have questioned how effective Monday's executive order might be, given the cuts Trump has made to the federal workforce since his second inauguration. Thousands of employees have been laid off at the NIH alone, with its workforce reported to be at its lowest level in decades. The NIH was also given a deadline to slash spending by 35 percent across all of its divisions, amounting to a massive $2.6bn budget reduction.

In April 2025, the HHS drew widespread condemnation and a multi-state lawsuit after abruptly moving to terminate regional contracts for the Women's Health Initiative, the nation's largest longitudinal study on older women's health at the time. Critics warned that the move would jeopardise life-saving research on cardiovascular disease, cancer and osteoporotic fractures for senior women. The new initiative comes against that backdrop.