Dear Menopause
Are you experiencing changes to your physical, mental and emotional health you find hard to explain?
Have you tried talking to your doctor/partner/employer/best friend and been left feeling unsupported?
In this weekly show, host Sonya Lovell interviews a range of experts and shares the stories of everyday people to help you understand what the hell is going on, why and where you can find support, empowerment and most importantly, a like-minded community.
Dear Menopause
95: Behind the Scenes of Australia's Menopause Movement with Johanna Wicks
How does an experienced women's health advocate struggle to recognise her own perimenopausal symptoms?
Join me as I explore Johanna Wicks' journey from confusion to advocacy, sparked by Dr. Ginni Mansberg's enlightening book, "The M Word." Jo's story reveals a significant gap in women's health education and sets the stage for her influential role in the national conversation on menopause in Australia. Through powerful initiatives, Jo has reshaped the landscape of menopause awareness and policy.
We'll take you behind the scenes of a groundbreaking event at Parliament House, where collaboration became the cornerstone of impactful change. Thanks to the support of the Parliamentary Friends of Women's Health, this initiative transformed into a successful Parliamentary Roundtable. Hear about the diverse voices that shaped the event, including Dr Ginni Mansberg and Professor Jayashri Kulkarni, and how their insights resonated with parliament members. These efforts laid the groundwork for ongoing meetings with experts and officials, paving the way for perimenopause to gain recognition at a national level.
As advocacy goes global, we're urging you to leverage your voice and voting power to push for the implementation of 25 Senate inquiry recommendations on menopause. With an upcoming election, public pressure is key to ensuring women's health moves to the top of political agendas.
We highlight the need for broader government action, such as a public awareness campaign for younger generations. Our conversation underscores the evolving narrative of menopause, from a hidden issue to a mainstream movement, fueled by passionate advocates and influential media initiatives.
We wrap the episode up with the introduction of a new segment in which Jo and I unpack what's happening in the menopause zeitgeist in real time!
Links discussed in this episode
Email Template for sending to government, opposition and local members provided by Wellfemme
Article in The Guardian UK by Kate Muir on bone health
The (M) Factor Film by Tamsen Fadal
The M Word Book by Dr Ginni Mansberg
Thank you for listening to my show!
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Welcome to the Dear Menopause podcast. I'm Sona Lovell, your host Now. I've been bringing you conversations with amazing menopause experts for over two years now. If you have missed any of those conversations, now's the time to go back and listen, and you can always share them with anyone you think needs to hear them. This way, more people can find these amazing conversations, needs to hear them. This way, more people can find these amazing conversations. Hi, I am here today with a woman that I cannot wait for you all to meet the wonderful, incredible human that is Joanna Wicks. Hey Jo, hi Sonia, how are you? This is hilarious, jo and I talk on a regular basis and all of a sudden, we've got the formality of being on camera and with a mic, and so it's all got all kind of formal. Don't worry, we'll warm into it. Jo, let's start off. Tell everybody a little bit about who you actually are.
Johanna:Well, my name is Johanna Wicks and I'm a women's health advocate. I'm also someone who is living through perimenopause I'm 47 and started to go through perimenopause at 42, but, like so many of us, had a very long and painful journey to get that diagnosis, which has helped fuel my advocacy.
Sonya:Yeah, and fuel it. It did Okay. So tell us a little bit then about how did you know, at 42, that you were going into perimenopause.
Johanna:Well, I didn't, which is one of the things that I think has really shocked me. So I started to not feel like myself. I had a lot of symptoms which I had no idea was anything to do with perimenopause. And in fact, the caveat is I had worked in sexual and reproductive health for 15 years. I knew a lot about women's health. I knew a lot about women's health, I knew a lot about women's bodies, but it turns out that knowledge only went up to pregnancy and fertility. I didn't actually know anything about what happens to women after that kind of fertile phase starts to come to an end.
Johanna:So you know, I kept going to the GP. I had muscular aches and pains, I thought I had arthritis, like so many of us, I thought I had dementia, I had chronic headaches, but mostly I had a lot of rage, which was really debilitating in terms of my family and my relationships. And this went on for two years of just constant appointments, constant tests, ct scans, ultrasounds. And it wasn't until I read Dr Ginny Mansberg's book, the M Word, that a light bulb went off and I actually then went and saw a women's health specialist.
Sonya:Well, thank goodness Dr Ginny wrote that book and you found it which is going to lead us into a really cool part of why I wanted to bring you on and introduce you to everyone today, jo.
Sonya:You took your whole experience and turned it into an incredible form of advocacy that has absolutely changed everything to do the whole landscape to do with menopause and perimenopause in Australia, and one of the things we're going to talk about is a whole lot of I'm going to call it the mechanics that have gone on in the background to get things like the Senate inquiry to get us to the point of the Senate inquiry. So the Senate inquiry kind of really put menopause into the conversation in the public, in the government, which was great. But what people don't know is that there has been an incredible amount of work that has gone on behind the scenes to even get us to that point of the Senate inquiry, and you, my dear, I believe, are 99% responsible for that. So let's talk about your history as an advocate in women's health and then lead us into how you came into this menopause space.
Johanna:That's a great question and talking about advocacy is my favorite topic in the whole wide world. Well, maybe menopause is not sure. So I've worked in advocacy for the last 15 years, as I mentioned, around especially around women's health and women's reproductive health and access to sexual and reproductive health and rights, and it's been very much a personal and professional passion. But that advocacy I've worked with a lot of not-for-profits around ensuring that women's health and women's reproductive health is on the policy agenda. So that's involved working with the government, you know, working in media, working with community groups to try and keep that conversation front and centre.
Johanna:So then, after I realised that I was in perimenopause and you know I had a lot of rage and disappointment that someone who is so knowledgeable about women's health could know nothing about this phase of life, and it really got me thinking. You know, why is it that women know so little about their midlife health? You know, why is it that someone as educated in women's health as myself had never heard the term perimenopause? And I started to do quite a lot of reading. I was looking at what was happening in the UK and there was this massive, you know, kind of community-led movement that was. You know women were demanding more and sort of. Simultaneously, whilst I was doing all this research, a friend in the reproductive health space reached out and told me that there was a pharmaceutical company that was wanting to talk to someone who knew something about menopause and advocacy to see what they could learn about in this space, so that took you on a whole new journey, didn't it?
Sonya:So you obviously went and had a conversation with that pharmaceutical company.
Johanna:Yes, and it was. I mean, it was a fantastic conversation because as I was chatting to them, I just realised all the things that you know could be, I guess, activated in Australia. So they had wanted to know what had been happening in the UK. They'd seen what was happening and they wanted to know why wasn't something similar happening in Australia and how would something like that, you know, grow in Australia?
Johanna:And as soon as I started talking and researching, it became apparent that there were so many opportunities to actually put perimenopause and menopause on the agenda in Australia, and so that initially started off with a consultancy. They were like well, how would this happen? How would you know a patient advocate go about starting this change? And I was able to draw on all my experience working in reproductive health and put together a map that you know outlined how you'd, you know, work with government, how you'd work with community and how you'd work with clinical professionals in the health sector, and you'd pull all three of those levers at once to get change. And, of course, after talking about this, I was pretty invested and I was really hoping that they'd say, oh, would you like to do this?
Sonya:And they did, and they did. Okay, so give us a timeline. What year was that first conversation that you had with them?
Johanna:So it was actually in April 2022. So just over two years ago and it was a really exciting time in the Australian landscape. So the piece of work that I did for the company in looking at the landscape actually was due right after the 2022 election, which I had deliberately said look, can I give you the outcomes of my research after that election, Because I knew that whatever happened in the election could really change the landscape. And what really excited me about the 2022 election was we now have a parliament with more women in it than ever before, and I actually mapped the age of everyone who was elected in the 2022 election and if you look at the women in the Australian parliament right now, a very large chunk of them are in the menopausal transition years and to me, I was like this is an opportunity for policy change, because this is a parliament that's going to understand this issue.
Sonya:Yeah, it was just like the perfect window of opportunity, wasn't it? I feel like it was this beautiful intersection of your passion and your experience and your lived experience with perimenopause and pharmaceutical company going. We want to make a change here. That's actually all about the patients having a better outcome, and I think that's something I'd really like to highlight in our conversation. You know, so often when we hear, particularly in the health industry, people talk about pharmaceutical companies, it's in this really kind of almost derogatory sense. You know, it's the dirty pharma. It's like, oh, you took money from pharma and look, there are instances where big pharma don't do good things, but that is so true, sonia, because I think it's been really interesting, having come from a not-for-profit background, to working.
Johanna:This was my first ever role in a for-profit company and I think it made me realise that, yeah, the biggest challenge I would have in putting perimenopause on the agenda was the perception that pharma is somehow dirty or negative, you know, when you unpack it.
Johanna:I can't imagine there's hardly a person in Australia that doesn't use a pharmaceutical product, and for me personally, the real light bulb moment was being, after two years of utter misery, of feeling terrible every day, when I saw the women's health specialist, I actually was prescribed menopause hormone therapy and within three weeks all those symptoms that had tormented me for two years disappeared. Now I understand this doesn't necessarily happen for everyone, but for me it was a real understanding of the power of replacing your hormones during this phase, and I was so grateful that there were pharmaceutical companies out there that were still manufacturing this product. Because, if we put it into the broader context, sonia, as you well know, after the Women's Health Initiative nobody was using menopause hormone therapy. A lot of pharmaceutical companies got out of the women's health space, stopped manufacturing these drugs and if it wasn't for the few who still make them. There wouldn't be access today.
Sonya:Yeah, that's a really good point, and I hadn't actually reflected on that potential impact. One of the things that we see and we hear a lot about currently, if we just flip back into current time, is the shortages of hormone therapy, and we know, for example, that certain pharmaceutical companies have actually stopped producing correct women's hormone therapy to make men's erectile dysfunction drugs, because there's bigger market, more money, and they just prescribe it like it's lollies, as opposed to HRT or MHT, which is so hard. So there is definitely a shift, or there has been a shift away from actually even producing female hormone therapy. So how grateful we need to be for the companies that do exist.
Johanna:Yeah, and I think that gets lost, as you said, because there's a lot of shortages at the moment and I've seen a lot of media and it even came up in the Senate inquiry, and one of the things that you know, I kind of I feel hasn't been unpicked is the reason there are such shortages is not necessarily anything nefarious. It's just that demand globally has skyrocketed and these companies are often small and have small production runs and they can only make so many products. So unless they build a new facility or they run their factory 24 hours a day, or someone new comes into the market, there is not the ability to just suddenly make, you know, millions more of this product, and that's where investment in women's health is so important. But, as you said, we've digressed, we're going to skip back in time. Yeah, well, it's a little bit of a. I think. You know the nuance around pharmaceutical companies is not as black and white as people like to paint it to be. Yeah, I agree, and that, I think, is kind of important.
Johanna:And what was exciting about this opportunity that I had was this was a company that had never done anything like this before and was like we want to want to help activate this space in Australia. There was a lot of freedom. There was not a lot of connection to the main business. There was absolutely no discussion about, you know, increasing any kind of product sales. It was very much about we see that women in Australia don't know very much about menopause and perimenopause. What could be done? If someone was willing to pay someone like you, jo, who does this for a living, what could happen?
Sonya:Yeah, yeah, and look at what has happened. So let's dive into what your first kind of, I guess, significant task was as a part of that role.
Johanna:So after mapping the parliament and seeing that there was a fantastic amount of women in parliament, the first I guess part of the role was I wanted to see who was doing stuff in the menopause space, talking to all of those key stakeholders, and you know that was really interesting because after 20 years of menopause, you know that was really interesting because after 20 years of menopause, you know kind of being demonized or HRT MHT being demonized, you know it was quite a small group of stakeholders. There were obviously people like yourself, sonia, who were trying to fill that massive gap around information and education. And that's how, you know, we connected when I was like who's doing stuff on menopause and then I discovered dear menopause.
Johanna:so it was, it was mapping all of that and then, seeing as I think it was about August, it was going actually the government's going to be thinking about its budget next, next year, let's put in a budget submission and start to see if we can work collaboratively with a lot of different doctors and academics to put in a budget submission. So that was step one. But as a result of that, I connected with the fabulous and late Peter Murphy and you know I wanted to meet. I'd wanted to meet with her to put perimenopause on the agenda and she actually offered and suggested doing an event in Parliament House that would be sponsored by the Parliamentary Friends of Women's Health.
Sonya:Beautiful, and that is what we now know as the Parliamentary Roundtable.
Johanna:Correct and that, again, you know, everything started to happen so fast. It was moving far more fast because, you know, when I had started the role, I'd actually said look, advocacy is very slow, it can you know you can't map it and you can't plan it. Very slow, it can you know, you can't map it and you can't plan it. It is something that is very hard to you know, wrap KPIs around. So I had kind of thought that things could take quite a few years, but it began to snowball and I think it was the momentum of having a government that had so many women in it and people were hungry and interested in a topic around women's health. And so, yeah, when Peter Murphy was like let's do something in Parliament House, of course it was like well, all right, this was in December, right before Christmas, and she's like how about early March? And I was like yay. And then I was like shit, really close, I love that, yeah, and it was a real. It was a real like okay, well, how do we want to do this If you're going to do something at Parliament House? So this would this would have been the third event I have organised at Parliament House and they are highly stressful because Parliament House is a moving, shifting beast. You never know what's going to be happening on any one day, whether anyone will turn up to your event. That is. That is the biggest heartping moment, because you can put hours and hours of love, sweat and tears into something and then, if something big happens on the day, no one turns up.
Johanna:So trying to put together a really engaging lineup so for me that was around having a mix of lived experience, of academic kind of credentials and also clinicians who could speak to the actual reality of seeing women and seeing patients. So it was quite an ambitious agenda. I think we had eight speakers in the end, you know, covering across that breadth. They were all incredible and so then also started working with the Australasian Menopause Society, who ended up hosting the event, and we had obviously Ginny Mansberg. I was very keen to have Dr Ginny present, given it was her book that had been the catalyst for my personal change. But we had Dr Ginny present, given it was her book that had been the catalyst for my personal change. But we had Dr Kelly Teagle from WellFam, professor Jayshree Kulkarni from the HER Centre at Monash Uni, professor Susan Davis from Monash University as well. So we had a really good array of speakers and then it was just around trying to raise awareness of the event and getting people along and what was the outcome of that event.
Sonya:So, from my perspective, that was when I started connecting in with everybody. You reached out to me shortly afterwards. I was aware of the roundtable. I remember that I met Shelley Horton in Sydney, actually at the New South Wales government menopause mixer that same night. So Shelley had been in Canberra at the round table and then flown up to come to this event that I was at in Sydney. It was the first time I met Shelley in person and I was really excited to hear what had happened at this round table because it was so groundbreaking for anybody that was invested, like I was at that point, in changing the conversation and raising awareness.
Sonya:And then I obviously met you shortly afterwards and through you connected with all the people that you've just mentioned, plus a whole host of others, and I really see you as the person that is responsible for creating this advocacy group that I feel so privileged to be a part of, because I come to it as someone with lived experience podcast host. But there are people like Professor Jayashri, kulkarni and Kelly Teagle and Ginny, and really amazing clinicians that Australia is so lucky to have. But we've all come together to create this incredible group that you spearheaded, incredible, and you know we've pushed everything forward as a result. So, from the roundtable, what were the outcomes from that?
Johanna:We've pushed everything forward as a result. So, from the roundtable, what were the outcomes from that? Well, I think you know, like you just said, Sonia, the key to any movement is around collaboration and working to make something that is more the sum of its parts, like being able to bring so many people together, and it creates a momentum. That is then you know what is a real catalyst for change. So I think what came out of the roundtable is the roundtable was brilliant. You know. We ended up having Assistant Minister Jed Carney open the roundtable. We had 17 members of parliament attend. For me it was a personal record, so I was really thrilled about that. You know, the conversation was really good. But around that actual roundtable meeting, we'd set up loads and loads and loads of other meetings with all of the experts.
Johanna:So I think there was probably about 19 meetings that was held before or after the roundtable, and it was from there that I think quite a few of the members of parliament got particularly interested in this topic. And that is what you want. You want it to be. An understanding of. This is a reality for a chunk of the population. This is, you know, that's where advocacy comes from. It's the. You're taking something from the community and taking it to Canberra, taking it to Parliament and putting it on the agenda, and I think it really had that purpose. There was quite a few MPs that then became, you know, quite personally interested in, and I remember, Sonia, you interviewed Zali Steggall not long after I did.
Sonya:I did actually because Zali was at the round table. I'd forgotten about that. Yeah, you're right, and that was what brought me to interview Zali was because I knew she'd been at the round table and I wanted to speak to someone from a political perspective that had been there. Yeah, that's right, yeah.
Johanna:And so Senator Larissa Waters was another one who I think she met with Dr Ginny and Shelley Horton around the roundtable and, you know, obviously clearly took quite an interest. So following the roundtable, there was sort of this beginning of this momentum. There were conversations happening. We saw menopause mentioned in Parliament House. We saw quite a bit of quite a few media articles come out as a result, and it was from there that, you know, some further conversations were held with different members of parliament and then Larissa Waters got passionate and decided to, you know, see if she could instigate a Senate inquiry and that's how the Senate inquiry sort of, I guess, took off. You know, it was that understanding. I think that there was a lot more to unearth or explore in this space and that it warranted further conversation.
Sonya:Yeah, and it was Larissa that, partnered with Senator Marielle Smith, so the two of them co-sponsored the very initial request to the Senate to have an inquiry, and I can so vividly remember the day that they stood up in the Senate and said we are co-sponsoring this inquiry. Am I right in remembering there was a vote to decide if the inquiry would even go ahead at that point? Yeah, and we were all kind of sitting around waiting to see the results and then it was unanimously voted yes, and that was just huge, absolutely huge, to even know that we'd got to the point where the senate inquiry was going to go ahead yes, and because there's only there's only a certain number of senate inquiries that are done each year, so it was going to be a real can.
Johanna:Can this one be squeezed in, given it was, I think it was quite late in the in the year when it was voted on, maybe October. So the fact that it got up, and I think the fact that it had a unanimous vote also speaks to the advocacy that everyone had been doing and the fact that the conversation was starting to get quite loud in the media and in amongst communities, because it meant that there was an awareness within Parliament and all the members of Parliament that actually this was a conversation that was going to be very relevant to the country, to the electorate, to their constituents.
Sonya:And I think a lot of people now are familiar with the fact that Senate inquiry went ahead. We went through a period where people were writing in their submissions. So there was lived experience submissions put in by multiple women's health bodies, universities, nursing bodies, catholic Women's Association in the rural and regional areas, and then from there we went into the phase of having the panels. There were seven held around the country Now, as most people will know spoke, so you got invited to speak. I guess that's the next thing to kind of cover off is that from the submissions that was put in by writing, the panel then decided who they'd like to hear in person from and give them the opportunity to expand. And I was on a lived experience panel. So I spoke from my experience of a breast cancer survivor with a medically induced menopause and it's's interesting. I actually did a podcast interview the other day with someone else for their podcast and she asked me a lot of questions around what it was like to speak on that lived experience panel and it was really interesting because it was the first time I'd unpacked all of that with someone that wasn't a part of our posse, if you like, our advocacy group, and it brought back to me how emotional that was. Now you were there with me in Sydney the day that I gave my experience. It was so emotional, yeah, and I was talking about how the you know it was incredibly emotional, but also from a logistical perspective, it was very clinical and it was five of us, sydney at our panel, and I was describing how we were all in this basically like a boardroom, if you like, no windows it was being live streamed through the Parliament's YouTube channel and into Parliament House, and so there was cameras and lights and sound engineers in the room, and then we were sitting facing the Senate panel and then behind us was the public gallery, I guess, if you like, which for me.
Sonya:I was really lucky. I had a number of supporters you amongst others that were sitting there with us, but there was also women on the panel with me that had just turned up by themselves. They had no support with them and you know we had three minutes to give our evidence statement. Now, being lived experience, we were de-identified, so it was given from an anonymous perspective and we weren't asked questions, so we just had three minutes to give our statement and then it was like thank you very much, appreciate your transparency and your honesty. And then moving on to the next person, and I found that really hard, not just the giving my story. I then very quickly shifted from being emotional about myself to supporting her and I was sitting there rubbing her back and like kind of supporting her. Yes, and it was such a strange experience Like I'm so grateful that I got the opportunity. It was such a privilege to be able to present this information, but gosh, it was hard.
Johanna:Yes, and because they moved from each lived experience presenter quite quickly Everyone had been chosen because they had very rich stories to tell I found myself I ended up in tears. It was very, very emotional, very draining. I mean very powerful is the other emotion that really struck me. But then it was all quite clinical because you know, the hearing was on a timeline and it was like, okay, all right, now you guys, you're done on to the next person and you're like, wow, that's kind of a lot of people reliving you know what is quite a lot of trauma, often Trauma, yeah, and then you know, moving on, which, when you're time pressured, you kind of understand.
Johanna:But I think what was powerful about all of those lived experience components across all the seven hearings is I think that's where you got the real nuance and the real depth which is so important to policymaking.
Johanna:So you know, as someone who's worked in policy for such a long time, you know you can have your clinicians and you can have your academics and they present very important things around data, around what guidelines are, but it misses the grey in between, it misses the impacts on actual human beings and that's where I think it's so important to the policy process to hear those lived experience stories. And I guess that's where I think it's so important to the policy process to hear those lived experience stories and I guess that's a real thank you from the Australian community to yourself and the others who are on those panels for reliving that trauma so that there could be your experience taken into the next step, which is formulating policy. And I think if you listen to all of the senators who are on that panel, they have all spoken about how impactful the lived experience components were.
Sonya:Yeah, yeah they have. And things that made me so proud when you know, had that moment when the recommendations were tabled in parliament recently and you know, if you read down the list of 1 to 25 in numerical order, the very first one is about having a consumer awareness campaign. But what made me so proud about that was that they presented in that recommendation that it must be co-designed with lived experience and that just made me so proud for myself but for everyone else that was involved from a lived experience perspective.
Johanna:And I think that's key, because so often if you don't have that lived experience component, then the policy or the campaign is not actually attached to the reality of how it's going to affect women's lives. But so, yeah, now we're right at the critical juncture of what happens next with that awesome report and those incredible recommendations.
Sonya:Yes, we are. So, Jo, you have experience with this, so talk us through. What should we expect now?
Johanna:So this is what I would say is almost the most important part of the campaign, because this is where we don't want that report to sit gathering dust, you know, somewhere in Parliament House with oh there's some good ideas, but we'll get to that later. There's more pressing issues. This is where it's really important to write or engage with your local representative and both the government and the coalition, because we will have an election sometime in the next six to 12 months, and so this is an opportunity to get some actual commitments from the government or from the coalition around what they will do to address these recommendations. Ideally, you want to see all 25 recommendations adopted and turned into policy so that there is real change, and most of them are very easy to do. Most of them would not take a lot of effort or funding to turn into reality.
Sonya:I think that's a note that we really need to just take a moment to really kind of recognise again is that it is again back in our hands, as the public, to put the pressure on our representatives, and that's at a federal level, it's at a state level, it's everybody to make sure that these recommendations continue to get pushed through.
Johanna:Think about it like this I think there's roughly 3 million Australians in the menopause transition at the moment. That is a large cohort of the electorate. That is a lot of voting power when it comes to an election, and I think what the Senate inquiry has demonstrated is that it wouldn't take much to really improve health outcomes for women in this cohort. So to me it makes good electoral sense, as well as good economic sense, to implement these recommendations in full. But, as you said, there's a couple of things you can do. You can continue to put the pressure on.
Johanna:Welfam has actually got on their website a link to a pro forma letter that you can use and then adapt to send to your local representative, because it is critical that all parliamentarians understand that this is an issue of importance. It's not just the health minister or the assistant health minister. It needs to be understood that this is a widespread issue that affects, you know, 50% of the population at some point in their life. So there is the momentum to do that. And what makes me feel a little bit optimistic as a policy wonk is there's nothing like an election to make parties get really behind particular issues and really commit to them. So from my perspective, this is the perfect time to get both the government and the opposition to commit to recommending the inquiry in full, and ideally I'd love to see the government they could get a few of those recommendations done and dusted before the election.
Sonya:Yeah, so talk me through. So, going back, there's a couple of things I wanted to pick up on there. One we do know that there will be an election coming up. Yep, once an election is called, the government then goes into like a caretaker mode, doesn't it Correct? And nothing kind of happens in that space. Is that right?
Johanna:Yes, yes, I think it's six weeks Actually I have to check that, but I think it's six weeks before the election. It goes into caretaker. There can be no new policies, no new funding allocated. It's basically like a shutdown period for government. So what you can do, though, you can work with governments and the opposition to commit to what they will do after the election. That's where you've still got. There's still that leverage to say well, should you be re-elected, what exactly will you do and what are the steps and the timelines and the amounts of money? So you'll see. If you think about it, you see a lot of election pledges in the lead-up to the election. You know we're going to give $50 million to diabetes. You know juvenile diabetes, or you know $ diabetes, or you know 25 million to eye health. So governments will make commitments and then, once they're elected, it's about sort of holding them to those commitments. Now, ideally, given that this issue affects so many women, I would love to see both sides of parliament have a bipartisan commitment to implementing the recommendations in full.
Sonya:Yeah, that would be amazing, wouldn't it? Okay, so the takeaways from that are we need to keep the pressure on all of government, and there is a beautiful template, as you said, that the team at Wellfem have put together. It's downloadable off their website. I'm going to pop the link into the show notes so anybody that wants to pump out a bunch of emails to you know politicians around the country, then this is a way that we can keep this pressure on.
Johanna:I did want to add when we're talking about, you know, the government and opposition, I wanted to give a massive shout out to the Greens, who have already committed to implementing the recommendations, and they've actually committed funding amounts against a number of the recommendations. So they have kind of come out of the gates first with putting money behind this report and the recommendations, and really it's up to both the Labor government and the Liberal opposition to follow in their footsteps what it is that they're going to do.
Sonya:Yeah, really good point, really good point. And you for for mentioning that, because we must remember that you know Larissa, as a Greens, has been so incredibly powerful and driving this forward, and for them to come out and be the first party to make those commitments is absolutely applaudable and we need to make sure we recognize them for that. But we need to put the pressure, as you say, on the other parties to come to the party as well. So the other thing to remember too is like when they do get into canvassing mode, they're going to be out on the streets and they're going to be on the phones. You know. Ask the question what are you doing about menopause? What are you doing about the 25 recommendations from the Senate inquiry? You know, just constantly be hammering that home so that we can keep it front of mind for them.
Johanna:And then that's kind of the end goal, because once something becomes policy or it gets into the budget and has money behind it, then that's when the real change happens for all of those of us with lived experience and all of those who will come after us. And my main goal is and I think we're on the way to achieving it is that for my daughter, who's 13, this is not going to come out of the blue for her. She is going to know that there are significant changes that happen for women in midlife, that there are a lot of hormonal fluctuations and all the symptoms and care and treatment that comes with that. And that's the end goal that there's so many of us who have had horrendous perimenopause experience or induced menopause experience like yourself, sonia is going to be much better managed going forward. That's all I want to see.
Sonya:I hope that your daughter also knows how big a part you played in that as well. When the time comes Without you no, she doesn't care right now.
Johanna:Yeah, my kids are like oh, you're talking about menopause again.
Sonya:I know all our kids are like that about menopause. Again, I know all our kids are like that. I hope in time, when she is a young woman and she really is able to acknowledge the impact that you and many of us have had in this space, to be able to create that future for them, because that's what I always come back to, as well as, like my biggest drive, that is, making the change for the generations that are coming through behind us. Awesome, that was such a cool conversation. I want to touch on a couple of things that are a little bit more current right now and when. I have had a little chat about whether we should actually make this a regular segment. Let's kind of unpack what's actually happening in the perimenopause and menopause space right now, not just in Australia, but also globally as well, because if you're on social media, you are massively impacted by what's happening in the UK or in the US or even other countries like Ireland and New Zealand as well.
Johanna:There is so much that's happening that you know, I keep you know. I keep WhatsAppping you, sonia, and being like how did you see this, or did you see this has come out, or what did you think of that? And yet there is a lot to kind of discuss and unpack and bring into the advocacy conversation so that when you are having those conversations, whether it's with your GP or your local member, you can have a broader understanding of what's happening globally.
Sonya:Absolutely. I think it's really important. So let's start with Minister Mark Butler on Q&A. Abc show talking about menopause ABC show talking about menopause that just blew my mind.
Johanna:I was like, wow, two years ago this would never have happened. And what a platform to have that conversation. So kudos to him too. You know talking about it and attempting to answer the questions. What did strike me, though and I don't know if it struck you, Sonia was the need for less talk, more action. Now I want to start to see the government say, yes, we're going to address these issues, and a really easy one is a public awareness campaign, Like the government rolls out public awareness campaigns for all sorts of health related issues, and that is something that would be quite easy to do.
Johanna:Obviously, I have very strong views on it. I want to see a campaign that's modern and directed towards Gen X and millennials. There's quite a lot of campaigns out there which I feel just don't hit the mark and don't engage with the audience, which are actually going through perimenopause at the moment, but there's some amazing examples from around the world, so the government could get really creative with a great creative agency and just start to run this out. That really excites me Even. You know. The government could do something itself. It doesn't have to, you know, do it through another third party. The Irish government's got a very cool 30-second ad that they've been, you know, putting out on TV and on billboards, which is eye-catching and grabs you and makes you want to know more. So I was super excited about Q&A mentioned, but I'm ready for the next step. I'm ready for a commitment. What did you think?
Sonya:Yeah, same same. Actually Fantastic for him, and it was him that brought menopause into the conversation. So they were talking more broadly about women's health and then he brought menopause into that, which I thought was absolutely fantastic. But, like you say, we can't just be having those tick box. You know, yeah, I talked about menopause on Q&A. We actually need to see the action. So, yes, great start, mark, let's keep going, okay.
Sonya:Next thing, the Ambacter film that is doing the rounds. It M-factor film that is doing the rounds. It's out of the US. It is put together by an incredible group. It's featuring the likes of Dr Kelly Casperson, dr Mary Claire Haver, sharon Malone some amazing American specialists.
Sonya:Basically, it's a bit of a 101 menopause kind of documentary, but the things I really enjoyed about it was that it dived into really recognizing the diverse experiences that cultural differences will make for women experiencing menopause.
Sonya:And, being an American production, they did dive a lot into the Black American population's experience and also how they've been treated from a health perspective in the past, which was actually really emotional and really hard to watch. What I drew from that was that we still have so much work to do here in Australia from a diversity perspective. You have, I think 10% of our population come from an Asian culture. Asian women have a completely different experience with menopause to what a white Caucasian woman will have. She doesn't often experience hot flushes, she might have aches and pains and is more likely to experience osteoporosis. And then we've got our First Nations people. We need to do so much more research on the impact of perimenopause and menopause on them as well and understand how they want to talk about it and how they want to be included in the conversation. I really felt like it was a great opportunity for us to shine a light on where we're still got gaps here in Australia.
Johanna:Yeah, I haven't had a chance to see it yet, which I'm very much looking forward to, but everything that I've seen, yeah, is summed up in what you said. But I think, yeah, there's an opportunity to get a lot of the emerging voices in Australia, like Professor Odette Best, and to get their contribution to this space and, you know, hopefully see something similar happen here. But what I think the M factor will do is that it's going to be an opportunity, for I can see women coming together to watch it, I can see it opening up lots of discussions and it is really putting menopause on the front page, so to speak. It's that real change from sort of two years ago, where no one was really talking about it in Australia, to now it's being mainstreamed in a way, and productions like this just help with that yeah, pushing the narrative and keeping that conversation going and elevating it up into the community.
Sonya:Yeah, good point, Okay.
Johanna:Next I was just going to add some of those.
Johanna:You know, some of those doctors are quite incredible, because what we're seeing now, sonia which I think you know, you'll know as someone who's a bit more social savvy than myself is that a lot of these doctors now have really large presences and followings on the socials on Instagram, on TikTok, and you know we're talking millions of followers and that's really changing the narrative.
Johanna:What I've enjoyed from following some of these, these Insta doctors, is, you know, they will take the research paper which I will read and be like what does that mean? I think that means that and they break it down for you, and they actually make that academic study accessible, accessible. Yeah, that is what that's. That's been the real game changer, I think, in terms of of, in terms of advocacy and awareness, is, you know, you've had academics who have been beavering away for decades doing great work, but no one has been translating that research for the masses, for your common woman, and this is where these Instagram doctors are doing such a huge global service. I guess is that I just soak up their content because it's so easy to digest.
Sonya:Yeah, absolutely. And look, I think there's a whole episode that we can do where you and I just talk about the impact of the Insta doctors for want of a better word and the pros and cons of that, because there are a lot of pros but there's also some cons and we're seeing some really ugly behavior play out. I don't want to dive into that right now, but I think let's park that for our next episode. So anybody that's interested in that, join us on that episode. The next one I wanted to talk about we'll finish off on this topic is there was a piece of research that was done in the UK that Kate Muir just had an article published in the Guardian about bone health. This was a fantastic piece of research, a great article written by Kate. What were your thoughts on that?
Johanna:Oh my God, I love this article and in fact I've been sitting on it, nesting on it, contemplating it about what I'm going to do with it, because it's powerful in so many ways. I mean, the fact that they had to use freedom of information to get the data that they talked about in the article around how many women had accessed HRT after having a fracture blew my mind. It's hard to comprehend how that could actually be fact, but it is. But it also made me go right. Well, what's happening in Australia? How many women have had fractures or breaks that have been related to osteopenia or osteoporosis, and how many of them have been offered HRT? I imagine that data is going to be really hard to get.
Johanna:But now I'm curious, now I want to dig and I want to find. But the fact that you know it took a journalist to get a grant and work with a doctor to uncover this just goes to show how important that community-based advocacy role that we're all playing is, because no one else was talking about that kind of you know, that kind of glaring gap in the NHS until Kate started digging. And that's where you learn and that's where, hopefully, you can get better. Um, yeah, no, that article blew my mind and I'm still digesting all the things I want to do with it and how I'm going to use it as an advocacy tool.
Sonya:This is why I love your brain and your passion and your drive. So for anybody that's not familiar with Kate Muir, she was the producer of the Davina McCall documentaries that played on the BBC last year. The year before there was two of them. I think one came out earlier, maybe a couple of years ago, and then there was a follow-up one. And, yes, Kate's a journalist, but she is a little bit like you. She's super passionate, she's a fierce advocate and she's not afraid to call it how it is and really position facts. She's written some amazing articles and been involved in some great documentaries. But yeah, this recent article on bone health I thought was absolutely fantastic. I'll link to the article in the Guardian in the show notes as well for anybody that's interested in following up on that. Jo, I have loved our chat so much.
Johanna:Yeah, this is a whole new thing for me and I was like oh, I'm so nervous, but it was actually really fun and it was just like our normal chats. It's just like our normal chats.
Sonya:Not as many F-bombs or rage about certain situations. But I think we'll keep the rage out of these conversations Unless it's warranted. I think if it's warranted we can bring the rage in.
Johanna:I'll try and have another coffee next time. So there's less peri moments where I'm like what's that word, what's that?
Sonya:word, thank you. Thank you. We are going to come back very soon with another episode. We are going to come back very soon with another episode just the two of us where we're going to talk about what's happening in the zeitgeist right now and we'll have a conversation about that. I'm really excited for these episodes, jo Me too, sonia. That was really fun, thank you.
