Angela Zhang

Donna pointed out the same thing.

Like, this has real life stakes.

And on top of that, there's the issue that some people don't fit into either of those buckets, like intersex people and trans people who have started gender-affirming hormone treatment.

Yeah.

And one of the most controversial ways that this can play out is through sex-based drug dosing.

Like the idea that women should be taking a different amount of medication than men.

And that's exactly what happened with the drug zolpidem, which is also known as Ambien.

Ambien, the pill that is designed to help people fall asleep.

Right.

So there's research showing that, on average, Ambien stays longer in women's systems than in men's, which means that a woman might be more sleepy the morning after taking it and could be at risk for driving accidents.

But some researchers pointed out a few concerns with the FDA making this change.

One was that, like we talked about earlier, there was still a lot of overlap with how quickly men and women process the drug.

Well, not exactly.

From talking to all these experts, it's really just about being super specific about what you mean when you study sex.

Like, if you're studying cervical cancer, your definition of sex will probably focus on anatomy.

Yeah, to make sure that you're studying a diverse set of people that represents society.

Yeah, pretty much.

And some experts have said there's still work to be done.

We've been focusing on NIH-funded studies, but there's still a lot of research that's funded privately.

That's why some people suggest that the policy requiring that women be involved in medical research...