Balancing act

NHMRC’s efforts to redress gender imbalance in senior investigator grants welcomed, but doubts remain

When the National Health and Medical Research Council announced its plan to split investigator grants equally between men and women, many hailed it as a step forward for gender equality—but not all researchers were convinced.

In October, NHMRC, Australia’s peak funding body for medical and health research, unveiled an initiative designed to tackle the “many barriers” faced by women and non-binary applicants to its flagship investigator grant scheme.