Women Are a Lower Percentage of Medical Doctors in the U.S. Than in Most Developed Countries

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and its 34 member nations work together to share experiences and seek solutions to common problems in order to improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world. Its headquarters is in Paris.

New data from the OECD finds that the United States ranks near the bottom among developed nations in the percentage of all physicians who are women. The study found that among all member nations, women made up 45 percent of all medical doctors. This is up from 38 percent in 2000 and 29 percent in 1990.

But in the United States in 2013, women were just 34 percent of all physicians. Among the 34 member nations of OECD, only Japan, Korea, and Luxembourg had a lower percentage of woman among their medical doctors. Leading all OECD nations was Estonia, where 74 percent of all physicians are women. In Slovenia, Finland, Poland, and the Slovak Republic, at least 56 percent of all physicians are women.