Background The UK 2024 general election manifestos publicly set out the political parties’ priorities for the eventuality that they are voted into government. We determined to evaluate whether already agreed, evidenced and promoted issues affecting women’s health in the UK had been included in the major parties’ manifestos.

Methods We curated a longlist of priorities and recommendations drawn from major women’s health reports, white papers, national inquiries and health strategies published in the UK over the last 10 years which are publicly available and invited our public contributors to suggest additional topics. We selected the shortlist of women’s health-related priorities – our top 15 ‘asks’ –using a Delphi process. We then devised a scoring system whereby manifestos were marked against the 15 priorities with a maximum of 2 points for each priority. We tested inter-rater reliability on the 2019 Manifesto.

Results Overall, the limited inclusion of prominent issues for women’s health in party manifestos was disappointing across the board. There was little difference between most major parties’ coverage of women’s health in their manifestos. All were limited. Most parties addressed two issues well: childcare and women returning to work after pregnancy; and violence against women and girls and the prosecution of perpetrators.

Several other issues, including assurance that all policy is built in consultation with women; decriminalisation and access to abortion; and women’s health hubs for reproductive, menopause and lifelong health, were considered by none or only one of the major parties.

Discussion Women’s health remains a fringe issue in UK politics, despite the efforts of patients, advocates and healthcare professionals to highlight the suffering that many women live with every day, and at particularly vulnerable and high risk periods of their life such as in pregnancy and the postpartum.

Our analysis highlights the importance of developing previous efforts in women’s health to strengthen existing infrastructure, collaboration and innovation. The next government should build on the work in progress, such as delivering the Women’s Health Strategy (2022) rather than starting afresh.

EM reports grants from NIHR for a COVID rapid response grant, Parasol Foundation for the Blood in Action study https://www.georgeinstitute.org.uk/projects/blood-in-action; royalties from Elsevier; consulting fees from Organon and Nabla Ltd; holds a patent for Bia, a wearable uterine contraction monitor; and is a Director of Lifecourse Health Ltd, a limited company for private obstetric and anaesthetic practice. JH has funding from UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship MR/T040750/1. KW has funding from Wellcome for the MESSAGE poject.

This study did not receive any funding

I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained.

Yes

I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals.

Yes

I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance).

Yes

I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines, such as any relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material, if applicable.

Yes