NHS Removes the Word ‘Women’ From Main Online Guidance Pages on Cervical Cancers

A photo of an NHS logo taken on Nov. 6, 2010. Dominic Lipinski/PA

The NHS has “desexed” its guidance on female medical conditions, by using “inclusive” gender-neutral language that excludes the words “female” and “women.”

The Times of London reported that the main NHS web pages on ovarian, womb, and cervical cancers no longer refer to women.

The National Health Service is the umbrella term for the publicly funded health care systems of the United Kingdom.

According to its inclusive content guidance, the NHS should use “sex or, better still, the body part associated with biological sex when we’re writing about things like screening that is sex-specific, for example, breast and cervical screening.”

But it does not use the word woman on some of its main pages, though it does sometimes refer to women under some subheadings.

The womb cancer main page used to say that “cancer of the womb (uterine or endometrial cancer) is a common cancer that affects the female reproductive system. It’s more common in women who have been through the menopause.”

Now it says that “most womb cancer usually starts in the lining of the womb (endometrium), this is also known as endometrial cancer.”

For the ovarian cancer main page, the site used to say that “ovarian cancer, or cancer of the ovaries, is one of the most common types of cancer in women. The ovaries are a pair of small organs located low in the tummy that are connected to the womb and store a woman’s supply of eggs.”

“Ovarian cancer mainly affects women who have been through the menopause (usually over the age of 50), but it can sometimes affect younger women.”

Now the guidance says that “ovarian cancer affects the 2 small organs (ovaries) that store the eggs needed to make babies. Anyone with ovaries can get ovarian cancer, but it mostly affects those over 50.”

A spokeswoman for NHS Digital told The Times of London that: “It is not correct to say that there is no mention of women on the ovarian, womb, and cervical cancer pages. We have updated the pages as part of our routine review of web pages to keep them in line with the best clinical evidence, and make them as helpful as possible to everyone who needs them.”

In 2020, Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust became the first UK hospital trust to adopt the terms “breast/chestfeeding” and “human milk” for its perinatal services.

In addition to the above, the hospital trust replaced “maternity” with “perinatal,” and “maternal consent” with “informed consent.” Parent was replaced by co-parent, and “second biological parent” was also added.