The medicalization of menopause is a process that has subtly been going on since the 1930’s, although it wasn’t until the 1960’s that it really picked up momentum in the public eye. This medicalization has transformed the understanding of what is a natural process, into one defined as a disease.
When you define something as a disease, then treatment becomes compulsory. And the implication is that if you don’t get treatment, or what is defined as acceptable treatment, then you are being irresponsible and negligent in your own health. Women’s menopausal experiences were for a long time dismissed as the product of their own imaginations, then later embraced by pharmaceutical companies and subverted to push their shiny new pills.
And given that HRT has been so widely taken up by women, and is still used despite its risks, it has been a successful approach by the drug companies.
The celebrity factor in promotional campaigns has been very effective at selling both the idea of menopause as a disease, and the promises of hormone replacement therapy. The FDA and their comparative bodies in most countries require that product claims...