‘She will not become dull and unattractive’: The charming history of menopause and HRT | Niki Bezzant

HRT was first successfully marketed as a cure' for menopause in the 1940s before a misreported study crashed sales in 2002

For centuries the symptoms of menopause were documented, but women went through it with little intervention. It wasn't until the advent of science as we know it that physicians (all male at the time obviously) started more commonly treating" its symptoms. It's clear now they had no idea what they were dealing with, since treatments ranged from the benign (cupping, cold water) to downright mutilation (clitoridectomy, anyone?).

Suffice it to say, the history of misogyny in medicine goes way, way back; all founded in the idea of women as inferior, and of menstrual blood as evil and poisonous. Fast-forward to the early 20th century, when it was discovered that oestrogen, in the form of conjugated equine oestrogen - yes, from horses - could be used as a hormone treatment for the symptoms of menopause. In 1942 the first oestrogen product was marketed under the name Premarin.