Thank you for the question. It's an important one.
You are correct. Gendered ageism is still alive in our workplaces and something that circles around the conversation of menopause.
I also want us to be really careful that this doesn't become an individual conversation. This is really about the workplace. It's really wonderful that this committee is looking at the impact on the workplace so that it isn't just left in the hands of an individual to navigate this.
On specific examples of work that has happened, I have mentioned the support groups and having a leader who brings together individuals who want to have those conversations. They may be allies. They also could be the members of our teams who are going through menopause. The topics may be all the topics we're talking about here today around understanding lifestyle strategies and understanding who your health care team is.
We've talked today a lot about physicians and nurse practitioners, but we also have physiotherapists, occupational therapists, dieticians, nutritionists and mental health practitioners. It's important so our teams, our staff, understand who they can be reaching out to and, as I mentioned earlier, what their benefits are, what's covered and what's not, so that we're not creating a two-tier system. If I can afford to pay for service A and somebody else can't, that's not fair either. I think those are important pieces within our workplace.
It is also really important for us to see who's missing from our conversations. I mentioned earlier that we often have the conversation around office-based professionals, but we're not looking at all of those individuals who might be in precarious work environments, who don't have benefits, who don't have supports or who are small business owners. How are we as a country supporting all of the workers out there? I'm giving you more abstracts and fewer specifics here, but it's just to say that, because the evidence focuses on those who are in very formal work structures, we forget about those on the outskirts of them.