Few schools have adequate sanitation facilities, and those that do are poorly maintained and unsuitable for MHH. The Urban Sanitation Project is responding with a sanitation marketing and hygiene promotion campaign emphasizing the improvement of menstrual hygiene for girls and women.

It is financing construction of 78 sanitation facilities in schools and market places in two project cities. Standard designs include handwashing facilities, accessibility for people with disabilities, and MHH amenities.

MHH and hygiene promotion activities, including training for teachers and pupils, will be conducted in the schools. These approaches will inform future interventions in schools across the country. The Enabling Environment for Menstrual Health and Hygiene: Case Study - Kenya.

Menstrual Health and Hygiene Resource Package: Tools and Resources for Task Teams PDF. Providing Sustainable Sanitation Services for All in WASH Interventions through a Menstrual Hygiene Management Approach PDF. Improving toilet hygiene and handwashing practices during and post-COVID pandemic in Indonesian schools.

The Rising Tide : A New Look at Water and Gender. A Holistic Approach to Better Menstrual Health and Hygiene: Entrepreneurs in Action. ItsTimeForAction: Investing in Menstrual Hygiene Management is to Invest in Human Capital. Menstrual Hygiene Management Enables Women and Girls to Reach Their Full Potential.

Menstrual health and hygiene empowers women and girls: How to ensure we get it right. In times of COVID, the future of education depends on the provision of water, sanitation, and hygiene services.

Reflections from a mother on Menstrual Hygiene Day. The SDGs, surveys, and the need for additional evidence on Menstrual Hygiene Management. Globally, periods are causing girls to be absent from school.

This site uses cookies to optimize functionality and give you the best possible experience. If you continue to navigate this website beyond this page, cookies will be placed on your browser. The site is secure. Learn more about the menstrual cycle from the Office on Women's Health and other websites.

A federal government website managed by the Office on Women's Health in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health at the U. Department of Health and Human Services.

ET closed on federal holidays. By loprespub on December 15, Disponible en français. Worldwide, many persons who menstruate experience period poverty — a lack of access to menstrual products, adequate menstrual health education and hygiene and waste management facilities.

Menstrual equity aims to provide all persons who menstruate with equal and inclusive access to menstrual products, in addition to barrier-free sexual and reproductive health and rights education in a stigma-free society.

In January , Scotland enacted the Period Products Free Provision Scotland Act , making it the first country in the world to provide free menstrual products to all persons who need them. The Act requires local authorities and education providers to offer free period products.

The Scottish Government prepared a financial memorandum that estimated total costs of the initiative, based on the population of 1,, women and girls aged between 11 and 55 years in Scotland.

As the Act came into force in , the Scottish Government launched PickupMyPeriod , a mobile app identifying locations of free menstrual products across Scotland. Text version. Menstrual Health and Hygiene in Canada , ; Environics Research, Attitudes and Awareness of Menstrual Equity and Period Poverty Among Canadians , Executive Summary, prepared for Women and Gender Equality Canada, 31 March ; and Leger and Plan International Canada, The Hidden Cost of Periods: A Canadian Perspective , 19 May Efforts to address period poverty will require improving access to menstrual products and to quality education and information for the whole population, whether menstruating or not.

The provinces have general jurisdiction over health care, including hospitals, the health care delivery system, the medical profession and the practice of medicine. Parliament has exercised its jurisdiction in health-related matters through its criminal law power and the federal spending power.

Initiatives to provide access to free menstrual products in Canada have been introduced by provinces and municipalities. For example, British Columbia , Manitoba , Newfoundland and Labrador , Nova Scotia and Ontario provide free menstrual products in schools, while New Brunswick provides free menstrual products in libraries.

The bills all died on the Order Paper. In , a motion on the subject was brought forward by Irene Mathyssen, Member of Parliament for London—Fanshawe:.

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should remove the GST from feminine hygiene products. In June , Parliament passed legislation that contained a section responding to the motion calling for the exemption of menstrual products from GST.

Menstrual health is increasingly conceptualized as part of the SRHR field and is also often included in programs that address water and sanitation and humanitarian assistance. Women and girls around the world may sacrifice other aspects of their health and lives to protect their menstrual health.

For example, some adolescent girls may engage in transactional sex to purchase period products , which can endanger their lives and health by increasing their risk of pregnancy, infection, and violence. A lack of menstrual hygiene management MHM —including clean water and safe washroom facilities—in schools coupled with the stigma surrounding menstruation leads to girls staying at home and missing school.

When they have to choose between managing their menstrual health or facing shame and humiliation at school, girls miss out on their education. Additionally, when women and girls have their periods they may be prevented from attending large events, bathing, or cooking because they are thought to be unclean.

Isolated from others and stripped of basic human dignity, women and girls are often shunned from society in more ways than one. Addressing menstrual health and rights is not just an SRHR issue, but also a human rights issue.

Menstrual health must be addressed holistically; policymakers, healthcare providers, educators, community leaders, and individuals can take steps to protect menstrual health.

Other countries have stopped taxing menstrual management products, recognizing that such taxes discriminate against women and girls. In healthcare facilities, healthcare providers should be prepared to give advice on managing period pain and offering or referring for screening for causes of severe pain or irregularities.

By delving into period health, activism, and self-advocacy, this program will guide your first steps in becoming the best menstrual equity activist you can be!

Here you can find the links to Toolkit, Script for the presentation, a draft presentation for the workshop or event and more resources to promote your event! Check out these incredible materials put together by our PERIOD Guatemala chapter!

If you have any other materials in another language you would like to share with the rest of the network, send them in to chapters period. In order to get your community involved in period health and education, you can host educational events either in person or virtually:. Inspire monetary and product donations with a panel of period related speakers!

PLAN : Find speakers to come and talk to your chapter! Ideally, these speakers will volunteer their time. Finding speakers from community organizations, healthcare professionals, and OBGYN is ideal.

Some interesting panel ideas could be: sustainable periods, period health, menstrual disorders endometriosis, uterine fibroids, etc. ADVERTISE : Spread the word! The great thing about speakers is that they draw many different communities to your event. EXECUTE : Have your event!

Be proud of yourself for engaging your community and successfully linking service and education. SHARE : Send photos of your event to PERIOD National!

We love to see chapters working in their communities. Spend the first 30 minutes of your chapter meeting talking about your own experiences with periods. This is a great team-building and icebreaker exercise!

You can use the PERIOD Talk materials to run in depth workshops about all things periods! Or build your own! The Rag Blog is a publication of PERIOD. that hopes to provide menstruators and non-menstruators with a platform to contribute to the menstrual movement through personal narratives and essays.

We believe the most powerful forms of advocacy include stories. If you are itching to share your experience with period poverty, make a call to action, or speak to your experience as a young activist, connect with us about contributing to The Rag.

The Launch Pad. Learn More Show submenu for Educational Resources Home Show submenu for PERIOD. Period Action Day Menstrual Hygiene Day. Let's Talk about Periods and Menstrual Health Showcase these conversations in your community or PERIOD. The factories are women-supervised and women-operated, facilitating jobs and the opportunity to learn entrepreneurial, marketing, and management skills.

The financial and marketing concepts will help me invest my earnings more wisely, and I will be able to generate significant returns.

Credit: Aakar. A year later, she and her husband launched the company. To date, AFRIpads has reached over 3. Sophia Grinvalds, co-founder and director of AFRIpads.

AFRIpads began solely as a reusable pad manufacturer, but they learned quickly that addressing menstrual health holistically meant going beyond the provision of menstrual products, says Grinvalds.

Today, in addition to manufacturing pads, they work directly with partners, including UN agencies and NGOs, to provide them with a range of additional resources, like an MHH Education Toolkit and a Data Collection Toolkit, distributed in four languages. Credit: AfriPads.

According to Thorsten Kiefer, co-founder of WASH United , the organization behind Menstrual Hygiene Day, the combination of business-thinking and focus on social impact that social entrepreneurs bring to the table has the potential to create disruptive new solutions and catalyze change.

Supporting a holistic approach can yield sustainable and lasting results. There are opportunities to involve the private sector and social entrepreneurs in pursuit of those goals. For governments, fostering an enabling environment and creating stable conditions for small and medium-sized enterprises can facilitate growth.

Improved quality standards in sanitary pad tenders, including referrable reproductive health resources on packs in tenders, would improve the ability of girls to manage their full period with dignity and more safely navigate adolescence.