Medicine in Spain is now mostly female: is discrimination over?

---

Women are the majority among Spanish doctors, but gender bias hasn't gone away

Medicine has long been a field where women's health was systematically ignored. Oncologist Elisabeth Comen documents historical cases of negligence in her book "All in Her Head": in the early 20th century, a young woman with chronic cystitis — probably endometriosis — had her teeth pulled out as a "treatment". Yet the 2026 data from Spain paint a very different picture: women now account for 62% of practising doctors and 69% of medical students. Seven out of ten new students are women.

Feminisation, or just a shift in bias?

A feminised profession does not automatically eliminate bias in care. Medical literature still underrepresents women in clinical trials, and diseases such as endometriosis take an average of 7 years to be diagnosed. The argument that "there's no more discrimination because there are so many female doctors" clashes with the reality that androcentrism in research and diagnosis persists. The feminisation figures are a fact, but they do not erase decades of neglect.

The ongoing debate

While some point out that medicine has historically been hostile to women, others reply that today most doctors are women, and that the problem has been reversed. The 2026 figure is striking: seven out of ten future doctors are women. But the question remains whether that demographic shift has translated into better care for women's health. The evidence suggests not entirely: gender biases in protocols and research take longer to correct than staffing statistics do.

---

The feminisation of the profession is a step forward, but not the goal. The real measure of success will be shorter diagnosis times and the inclusion of women in clinical trials. For now, enrolment figures do not heal transgenerational wounds.