‘Women in Pharma’ is a new group that’s been making waves on LinkedIn. PharmaTimes caught up with the founders to discover more

Miriam and Sarah bounce in wearing their bling trainers, brimming with fizz – purpose shining from their eyes. Their energy is infectious. But why the need for Women in Pharma?

“The funny thing is I really never thought of myself as a woman. I had an allergy to loud groups of women and was always happy being one of the guys,” reflects Miriam, VP marketing EMEA for Santen, a specialist ophthalmology company.

So, how did she come to co-found the trailblazing Women in Pharma project?
“I’ve got Sarah to thank for that. It was her idea and I couldn’t resist,” Miriam confided.

Sarah – owner of boutique healthcare creative agency Wordbird – and Miriam had a pact to meet after the COVID pandemic and over a mimosa brunch in London, Sarah proposed the idea of Women in Pharma.

“I’d just come back from an exclusive evening called ‘Diamonds’ – a female entrepreneur club. I didn’t think I deserved to be there amongst all the CBEs and OBEs. I’m just a boutique creative agency owner from Essex,” Sarah remembers. “But then I heard their stories. So inspirational and relatable. And I thought ‘they’re just like me’. And then I thought, ‘why don’t we do this kind of event in our industry?’.

“All we see are the awards winners. The outcomes and the egos. But not the people and stories behind them. We women could really benefit from that,” she adds. “If you can’t see it, you can’t be it.”

Over the last two years, locked down alone with her two teenagers in their bedrooms, Miriam had reinvented herself from stressed-out, international travelling, single parent, perimenopausal superwoman – living in fear and constantly trying to prove herself – to yogi female empowerment guru and ‘Tiny Habits’ coach, on a mission to improve the lives of as many people as possible! A major overhaul to say the least.

This version of Miriam met the super-inspired Sarah, who in parallel had experienced her own personal transformation. She’d also overhauled her well-being habits, while running her own business and being the best possible mum to a younger son who has been living with significant mental health issues for the last four years.

After two years of doing this during lockdown with her husband and business partner, Andrew, she was completely up for a ‘purpose project’!

By the time they clinked their second glasses together they were already halfway through the business plan.

What is #womeninpharma all about? “We have three pillars” enthuses Miriam. “The first is to inspire each other by sharing our stories (#weinspirepossibilities). We are also running events, both online and in person, as well as creating places for our ‘pharma sisters’ to inspire each other with their stories.”

Indeed, Women in Pharma has just had its own launch event – INSPIRE! – in London, with over 70 in attendance and a waiting list. Miriam and Sarah were naturally blown away with the interest and in awe of the inspirational speakers.

“It’s so easy to get stuck at home behind our screens, feeling even less confident or motivated to go out networking – something so many of us women hate! But all those who came were so buzzed from the experience and so happy to have met such a wonderful group of mostly women from our industry,” explains Miriam.

“We have a podcast too – Loose Women in Pharma. It’s a mix of more serious topics with guests and weekly catchups every Friday chatting about whatever has been going on in our lives. It generates all kinds of conversations which we’ve heard people particularly enjoy!” laughs Sarah.

Women remain underrepresented at the top of the corporate ladder.
In 2021, they represented only 28% of pharma executive leadership teams with biotech only slightly ahead at 35%.

Most CEOs and presidents are white males and they hold the majority of line roles in pharma (64%)/biotech (68%). Line roles control money, people, production, and commercialisation of product.

Yet UK companies with at least one in three women on their executive committees achieved 10x the profits of those with no women.

“Our second pillar is to EMPOWER and support each other to fulfil our potential” (#weignitepotential).

“We’ve already run some webinars and we’re planning to offer coaching and mentoring programmes for people at different stages in their careers in conjunction with our collaboration partners, such as Cognomie and Vital Thrive,” says Miriam.

“It took us half our lives to feel this confident and purposeful. Imagine if I’d let go of my fears and limiting beliefs a bit earlier in life. What could I have achieved?”

“But I’m sprinting now to make up for the last years of playing safe and juggling the demands of being a single parent,” she insists. “We are setting up a group called Young Women in Pharma (YWiP) which will have its own leaders and develop their own ideas of what we should work on. We can’t wait to hear the perspectives and ideas of our advisory group.

“Women in Pharma’s next in-person event – ‘EMPOWER!’ – is in the making and we want to make happen before the summer so watch this space!”

Women in Pharma wants to shape how the industry evolves to better serve womankind.

For our sisters, mothers, daughters and granddaughters. (#whatispossible).

“The day after our brunch I had gone to a bookshop, another post-COVID thrill, and was browsing the bookshelf containing books about women. I bought two books. One recommended by Sarah – Work Like a Woman by Mary Porter. The other just leapt into my hands off the shelf,” Miriam reflects, “called Invisible Women by Caroline Criado-Perez.”

She explains: “It analyses publicly available data and looks at it through a female lens. From product and service design, like cars and bus timetables, to the financial and legal worlds, to healthcare and medicine. The world is designed for and in the interests of men. And that includes medicine.

“Since Aristotle medicine has assumed all bodies are the same, except for reproductive bits, with females assumed to be just smaller males. In reality, every cell of our body is biologically gendered. The way our bodies work, what can go wrong, the diseases we get, the symptoms we experience and the way treatments actually work (or not) can differ based on our biological gender.

“But we’ve not even been interested or looking for it all this time. I was thinking, ‘how can I have been in the industry for the last 25 years and not have realised this’? I was flabbergasted!” confesses Miriam.

“Of course, I didn’t believe it either,” confirms Sarah. “Until I went and did the required poring through the evidence. It was true, and the Women’s Health Strategy for England published in 2022 confirms it.”

Women spend a significantly greater proportion of their lives in ill health or disability when compared to men.

Women are 50% more likely to receive a wrong diagnosis when having a heart attack.
What are known as the classic symptoms for heart attacks are ‘classic’ for men.  Women are actually more likely to experience breathlessness, fatigue, nausea and what feels like indigestion, than pain in the chest and down their left arm.

Women are more likely than men to suffer adverse side effects of medications because drug dosages have historically been based on clinical trials conducted on men. The menstrual cycle impacts female drug responses with antipsychotics, antihistamines, antibiotic treatments, heart medications and some antidepressants.

The second most common adverse drug reaction in women is that the drug doesn’t work even though the drug works in men.

For decades, however, women were excluded from clinical drug trials based, in part, on unfounded concerns that female hormone fluctuations make women difficult to study.

“We have a lot of work to do. But we’re so excited and up for it. There are not enough hours in the day, but we’re prioritising our well-being and selfcare. You have to put your own oxygen mask on first. And with my son having such a challenging time with his mental health and being in hospital for almost a year, I’ve had to learn how to do this BIG time,” Sarah confided.

She adds: “We can’t do this alone. We’re cultivating a sisterhood to get involved and create a truy supportive community; to help us all grow through sharing our energy and ideas – shaping the industry and medicine. To do better for women and all those who rely upon us.

“We’ve only been out there for six months but so much has happened; the response has been overwhelming and we know the amazing women in our industry have so much to give each other, and so much drive to make their difference in the world.”

I didn’t even need to wish them luck with their ventures as they bounced out the door. The momentum seems like it will be unstoppable, begging the question #whatispossible?!