A lack of awareness and affordability limits women’s access to healthcare. Low health literacy and limited exposure to digital and informational resources restrict women’s ability to recognise health needs or seek timely care. Low female labour force participation limits women’s decision-making power at home, restricts their digital participation and contributes to poor health awareness among them.
In our paper titled ‘New Ideas and Innovations for Women’s Health in India’, in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industry, the Gates Foundation, and the Women’s Collective Forum, we have proposed the IDEAS framework, a guiding tool to help policymakers and innovators develop inclusive digital health solutions in India. By combining the themes of Innovation, Digitalisation, Equity, Accessibility and Security, the framework crucially shifts the focus from ‘how fast we can scale this’ to ‘who can use this safely today.’ The framework calls for technology to be inclusive, secure and grounded in women’s lived realities.
The latest invention in healthcare fails women “because technology is not designed by women and for women,” says an expert leading primary healthcare projects in several Indian states. Beneath the surface of India’s digital health revolution, a gendered faultline emerges. Women are present in numbers but missing from the heart of health-tech design and delivery.
UNESCO reports that women constitute only 19% of inventors and just 22% of the global AI workforce, showing that technology continues to be shaped by a predominantly male perspective. India has built the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission, issued over 799 million ABHA IDs and expanded digital and AI-driven health solutions.
Women are 12% less likely than men to own mobile phones and 30% less likely to have access to the internet in India, according to recent GSMA data. The gap widens in rural settings, where socio-cultural norms and reliance on shared devices, often controlled and monitored by men in the family, further hinder women’s access to digital health resources. This creates a troubling paradox: the very technology meant to bridge inequities ends up widening the gender health divide.
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Even women within the healthcare system, such as the Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs), expected to anchor the digital transition on the ground, experience the overwhelm of technology, much like any other woman. They are overburdened by repeated data entries across multiple state and central government apps, highlighting the need to move beyond mere digitisation towards digitalisation and greater interoperability across platforms. While they are champions within their communities, they are not immune to the conventional restrictions placed on women.
“One ASHA was unable to operate an app. On gentle probing, she admitted her inability to read and her dependence on male relatives for device use,” said our expert, exposing the glaring gap between ground realities and national projections. When technology feels demanding even to women within the system, how can those outside the system feel empowered by it? Simple and practical solutions, including a living labs approach to co-create digital tools ‘under a mango tree’ with the end-users, offer a promising way forward.
Beyond field-level challenges, technology design itself often alienates women. While numbers show that health apps are installed and users registered, actual use tells a different story. Barriers such as low female literacy and the absence of linguistically attuned digital health tools further limit access and inclusion. Multi-lingual, voice-enabled interfaces can make technology more intuitive and accessible. More importantly, strengthening digital literacy for women through targeted community and school programs must become a policy mandate.
Acceptability and accountability issues add to the complexity. Period trackers, pregnancy monitoring apps, and sexual and reproductive health innovations are rapidly expanding, but so are the concerns around trust, data security and digital abuse. The regulatory frameworks in India remain weak and fail to ensure adequate data protection. If technology is to truly empower women, it needs to move beyond coverage and enrolments to inclusion, trust, ease and ownership. This means continuous user consent, privacy on shared devices, and gender-sensitive technology.
India’s digital health journey is impressive in scale and can be leveraged to bridge inequities in health delivery and outcomes. The real test is not how many women are enrolled, but how many can use an app without permission, mediation or fear. For digital health solutions to truly be gender-transformative, women must lead their design, implementation, and governance. The IDEAS Framework--Innovation, Digitalisation, Equity, Accessibility and Security—offers an actionable guide to develop the digital and AI infrastructure for a Viksit Bharat 2047.
Deepshikha Batheja, Navsangeet Saini, Subhiksha S of Max Institute of Healthcare Management, Indian School of Business
First Published: Dec 03, 2025, 18:27
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