Investing in Women’s Health Is a Smart Economic Move. Why Aren’t We Funding It?

Earlier this month, global leaders gathered in Seville for the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development (FFD4), at a time of immense global conflict, crisis and need. But despite committing to accelerate investments at the scale and speed the world needs, leaders overlooked one of the most cost-effective ways to boost economic growth and sustainable development: investing in sexual and reproductive health.

In the final document of the conference, language about sexual and reproductive health was consolidated within gender equality, or broadly just health — where investing in sexual and reproductive health threatens to get lost.

This decision is both disappointing and shortsighted. Investments in sexual and reproductive funding and care, which allow individuals to decide if and when to get pregnant and include the goal of universal, equitable access to contraception – are among the highest-yielding in global development. According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), every dollar spent on family planning and maternal health in developing countries yields an estimated US$8.40 in benefits through reduced health costs, increased productivity and improved educational outcomes. 

These investments have proven real-world impacts: Between 2016 and 2022 in Senegal, the government partnered with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) for the procurement and distribution of over 36 million family planning and reproductive health products to USAID-supported facilities. The contraceptives, when combined with proper counseling and correct use, are estimated to help prevent 1 million unintended pregnancies, 2,000 maternal deaths, and 15,000 child deaths in Senegal alone. The ripple effect of these impacts? Approximately $61 million in healthcare cost savings.

Failing to invest in sexual and reproductive freedom carries a heavy economic burden with increased demand on public budgets, diverting resources from other vital development areas, and ultimately hindering economic growth. And yet, nowhere in the Seville Commitment do world leaders acknowledge the need to invest in this sector. While the outcome document of the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development gestured in the right direction, with language urging stakeholders to prioritize gender equality, health system strengthening, and empowering women and girls, it missed an opportunity to be very clear that women and girls cannot succeed if they do not have equitable and reliable access to sexual health resources and reproductive care.

Regrettably, this oversight is not unique to the conversations in Seville. Global funding for healthcare has historically underscored the neglect of sexual and reproductive health. The choices currently being made in health financing, which often favor short-term emergency responses, risk undoing decades of hard-won gains in women’s, children’s, and adolescents’ health that have helped cut in half the rate of deaths in children under five and reduced maternal deaths by 40 percent. Sexual and reproductive health care is consistently underrepresented in global health financing, despite being foundational to every health and development outcome not only to women and girls but to the communities and economies that surround them. 

Even as family planning and sexual and reproductive health remains a development best buy, in that investing in family planning saves money across other development goals, we must reckon with the shifting sands of global aid. According to an analysis by Kaiser Family Foundation, 70 percent of donor funding for family planning has already been cut or is at imminent risk, while demand for services is growing — particularly in Africa, where funding cuts have been the largest. Abrupt and severe cutbacks in donor financing are not just budget-line adjustments, they are life-threatening. According to the Guttmacher Institute, USAID-funded projects provided 130,000 people every day with contraceptive care that they no longer receive amid recent funding cuts. The situation is even more concerning in areas that were already in crisis: a May 2025 UN Women survey found that almost half of women’s rights groups in crisis settings will shut down by November if current funding levels persist.

This crisis calls not for despair, but for reinvention.

First, we urge the Ministers of Finance and the respective Members of Parliament to scrutinize budgets and ensure they explicitly include sexual and reproductive health. This requires bold political leadership in national health budgets. Let us together commit not only to fund these services but to embed them within universal health coverage frameworks. Sexual and reproductive health is not an “add-on.” Rather, it is a necessary element of human development, a cornerstone of any health system that claims to be people-centered and equitable.

Second, as we discuss where else money is going to come from, let’s wisely unlock the potential of diverse financing streams for sexual and reproductive health and rights. Shared value models with the private sector could promote the rights and equality of women and girls and show the value of their participation in communities and the workforce, creating incentives for private sector investments. Innovative financing mechanisms such as debt health swaps cancelling or restructuring debt to incentivize health investments; development impact bonds — where private investors fund development programs upfront and are repaid by a donor or government only if agreed-upon outcomes are achieved; or volume guarantees — where purchasers commit to buying a minimum quantity of contraceptives to get a lower price, have all been discussed. These newer financing models just need to be executed at scale. 

Third, we must recognize the power of partnerships. No single actor can solve this alone. Multilateral institutions, governments, civil society, youth leaders, feminist movements and the private sector must come together not in silos or parallel efforts, but in true collaboration. We saw this spirit in Seville, where the multi-sector reproductive health community showed up in force. We have seen the strength of this approach in initiatives like PMNCH, FP2030, and She Decides, where coordinated action has amplified voice, increased accountability for governments, and driven results. Since its founding in 2012, FP2030 has seen contraceptive users double in 27 countries. PMNCH since 2010, has supported the Every Woman, Every Child movement to mobilize 776 commitments, including financial commitments worth a cumulative total of nearly US$186 billion. We need more of these results.

The conference in Seville was more than just a global gathering; it was a litmus test. Will we “walk the talk” on rights-based health financing? Will we place women and adolescents at the center of global economic recovery and resilience? Or will we once again sideline their needs?

Let us be clear: there is no path to sustainable development without investing in sexual and reproductive health and rights. No health system can be truly resilient if it fails women and girls. No economy can thrive if it neglects half its population, and no financing architecture is just if it overlooks the rights and needs of the most vulnerable.

It is time to act with courage. It is time to fund what works. It is time to deliver on the promise of dignity, choice and health for all.