On August 26, 2026, the Spanish Agency for Food Safety and Nutrition (AESAN) confirmed it will send its official report on diet and healthy habits during menopause back to its scientific committee for review, after researchers demonstrated that some of its recommendations rest on reference values drawn from studies conducted exclusively in male populations. The complaint came from scientists at the Asociación Española de Mujeres Investigadoras y Tecnólogas (AMIT), who found the document — published earlier in 2026 — used European Food Safety Authority reference values without disclosing that the underlying study populations were men. Spanish outlets including La Vanguardia, El Mundo and ARA reported the reversal; FemTech World covered it in English on August 31. AESAN acknowledged an "omission of a warning" and said more research focused specifically on women during menopause is needed.

Why It Matters

For the menopause-tech and femtech sector, this is a rare public failure of the *reference layer* rather than of a product — and the reference layer is what every downstream company builds on. Menopause platforms, supplement brands, symptom-tracking apps and telehealth prescribers all cite national and supranational nutrition and clinical guidance to substantiate claims and satisfy regulators. When a national food-safety agency concedes its own menopause guidance imported male-derived values without flagging it, every commercial actor that cited that document inherits the defect. The commercial context makes this sharper. Menopause is currently the fastest-repricing segment in women's health — a category that went from institutional neglect to a genuine investment thesis in about three years, with Joylux, Evernow, Midi, Gennev and a wave of supplement entrants competing partly on clinical credibility. Sexual wellness sits directly inside it: vaginal dryness, dyspareunia, libido change and pelvic health are core menopause symptoms and core sextech product categories. Brands in that space differentiate almost entirely on the strength of the evidence they can point to, which makes the integrity of the underlying guidance a competitive input, not a compliance footnote. Two takeaways for operators and investors. First, diligence on menopause and femtech claims should now include asking what population the cited reference values were actually derived from — a question most product teams have never had to ask, because they reasonably assumed a menopause guideline was built on menopausal women. Second, expect this to become a marketing wedge: the first brands to publish sex-specific evidence provenance for their claims will have a defensible story, and the ones quietly citing EFSA-derived numbers will not enjoy having that surfaced by a competitor. AESAN's review timeline has not been announced, and the corrected report is the thing to watch.

The guidance itself is unremarkable on its face, which is part of the point: it recommends a diet rich in protein, omega-3, fibre, calcium, iron and vitamins alongside regular exercise with emphasis on strength training, aimed at reducing menopause-associated risks including loss of bone and muscle mass and cardiovascular problems. Spanish reporting indicates the specific values flagged by AMIT include iron and vitamin C. Those are not trivial parameters to import from a male reference population into a document written for perimenopausal and postmenopausal women, whose iron requirements shift substantially across the menopause transition.

The political response was immediate. Spanish equality minister Ana Redondo publicly called for the document's review, writing on X that situations like this "do not happen again" and adding: "It is about time women were present in health agendas and studies, and the male body stopped being the universal reference point for everything, even for issues related to the menopause." The episode lands in a well-documented context — decades of clinical-trial populations skewed male, producing diagnostic thresholds, symptom profiles and dosing guidance calibrated to a body that is not the patient's.

Sources

Update — 2026-09-01

{Initial entry — story first created.}