Our Roots
Starting with the 1970 Pill Hearings, women let it be known that they would no longer blindly accept what they were told by doctors, the medical establishment, or their government. A women’s health movement developed, knit together by hundreds of grassroots women’s health projects in communities across the United States.
45 years later, the Networks’ advocacy efforts and the independent health information we provide have made a difference in the lives of millions of women. Despite our successes, however, our work is far from done. Decades years after the first protest, we still need to raise our voices to say that women’s lives matter and women’s health matters!
1970: The Pill Hearings The 1970 Senate Pill Hearings brought women’s voices to Congress for the first time. The hearings were based on the investigative reporting of a pioneering journalist, Barbara Seaman.
The Pill Hearings
The 1970 Senate Pill Hearings brought women’s voices to Congress for the first time. The hearings were based on the investigative reporting of a pioneering journalist, Barbara Seaman, who uncovered and publicized the Pill’s serious and life-threatening health risks. Seaman’s cause was taken up by Senator Gaylord Nelson (D-WI), who organized Congressional hearings in order to build support for public policies giving all patients the right to written information about the drugs they were prescribed. The hearings were the subject of intense interest because, at that time, it was rare to publically discuss either sex or birth control. They became headline news when members of D.C. Women’s Liberation, led by Alice Wolfson, injected themselves into the process. Standing up from their seats in the audience, the women loudly raised their objections to the fact that no women were either testifying at the hearing or serving on the Senate Committee. They demanded that women’s voices be heard. Their bold action provided inspiration for a growing women’s health movement, which demanded that decisions about women’s bodies can only be made with the involvement of women themselves. Seaman and Wolfson went on to co-found the National Women’s Health Network and the movement they and others sparked is the foundation our continuing advocacy efforts on women’s health.
Our Founders
A small group of visionary women recognized the need for an organization that could function as an "action arm" of the women's health movement by directing influencing policy in Washington, D.C.
Barbara Seaman
Barbara Seaman
Phyllis Chesler
Phyllis Chesler
Belita Cowan
Belita Cowan
Alice Wolfson
Alice Wolfson
Alice Wolfson is a veteran political activist and a pioneer in the women’s health movement. She belonged to DC Women’s Liberation, and was a member of "The Daughters of Lilith" collective. Hers was one of the leading voices protesting the lack of female participation in the 1970 Pill Hearings, as well as the deliberate withholding of information regarding oral contraceptives’ dangerous side effects. Women’s actions during the Pill Hearings and their demands for informed consent led to the first wide-scale patient package insert informing patients of potential dangers on a prescription medication. Alice organized many other actions during the National Women’s Health Network’s early years, including a sit-in in the office of the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Welfare, and the first FDA Protest. Alice served on the NWHN board of directors for several years. She also co-founded the Committee to Defend Reproductive Rights, which fought for and won both California state regulations protecting women against sterilization abuse and court decisions guaranteeing MediCal coverage of abortion. Today, Alice is a lawyer fighting for the rights of disabled individuals who have been discriminated against by their insurance companies.
Mary Howell
Mary Howell
Continuing the fight
Our Impact
As times have changed, the Network has changed with them.
Today, we place a growing emphasis on new forms of organizing in addition to our consistent watchdog work. As part of our Raising Women’s Voices project, we work with grassroots local leaders to expand health care access and ultimately, transform the way health care is provided. Women’s health is human health, women’s rights are human rights, and the fight for health equity and justice isn’t going anywhere.