President signs order creating NIH Women's Health Division and White House task force

Executive Order 14437 of October 19, 2026 directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through the Director of the National Institutes of Health, to establish a Women's Health Division within an appropriate NIH institute or center within 90 days. The division will increase scientific review of understudied women's health conditions, advance and coordinate research, promote innovative technologies, strengthen interdisciplinary collaboration, support data-collection methods that improve sex-specific outcomes, develop grant-recipient accountability for the NIH sex-as-a-biological-variable policy, and facilitate translation of discoveries into practice.

The order also creates the White House Women's Health Task Force, co-chaired by the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff. Membership includes the Secretaries of War, Agriculture, Labor, Education, Veterans Affairs; the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; the Commissioner of Food and Drugs; the Directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health; the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services; and other administration officials invited at the co-chairs' discretion. The Department of Health and Human Services shall fund the Task Force's administrative costs.

The Task Force is charged with a comprehensive, life-stage approach to women's health, focusing on advancing science, accelerating evidence-based translation, promoting patient-centered care, and consulting with states, tribal nations, local jurisdictions, community and faith-based organizations, the private sector, and philanthropic entities. It may hold public hearings, meetings, and roundtables to gather expert input.

The order revokes Executive Order 14120 of March 18, 2024, and the Presidential Memorandum of November 13, 2023. It affirms that nothing in the order impairs the authority granted by law to executive departments or the Office of Management and Budget, and that implementation is subject to the availability of appropriations. The order does not create any enforceable right or benefit against the United States or its agents.