Politics of 'period poverty' and what needs to be done

Student and activist Valentine Ndimu. [File, Standard] "Anything you can do I can do bleeding", read the message emblazoned on Senator Gloria Orwoba's t-shirt. For years, even millennia, societal shame and objectification towards women's bodies was silently condoned and normalized. You would imagine that with the independence, and modernization of the state, including the rebirth of our country in 2010 a lot in this regard would have changed. Well, it has not and much to the frustration of the Kenyan women who placed a lot of premia in the 2010 revolution. On Valentine's Day a week ago, Orwoba walked into the Senate chambers with a white power suit stained in red. She was a woman on a mission. While it was not surprising that she was asked to leave the Senate Plenary given the deeply ingrained societal shame on the topic, Senator Orwoba gifted the country with an opportunity to revisit the subject. Her efforts in combating period poverty and pushing the Sanitary Provision Bill (amongst others), which is aimed to tackle period poverty by supplying free sanitary towels to all schoolgirls and prisoners in Kenya, have not gone unnoticed. Senator Gloria Orwoba (right) at the Senate in a suit stained with red dye as part of her campaign for free access to menstrual products. [Elvis Ogina, Standard] Her work has been magnified on a global scale because this stigma and shaming towards women's reproductive health is present worldwide. According to the World Bank in 2020, women made up 50.4% of the nation's population. Women make up a little over half the country's population, yet on the report of the MOH in 2020 on Menstrual health in Kenya, only 46% of women and girls in rural areas and 65% in urban areas have access to and use disposable pads. Moreover, 20% of young girls and women have to use make-shift products such as toilet paper, pieces of blanket, cloth, or natural materials to manage menstruation. The lack of access and presence of stigma is a big issue facing the educational career and safety of many young girls in this country as 10% of 15-year-old girls have reported that they were given menstrual pads from sexual partners, in addition to the young girls who fall victim of sexual coercion in order to receive menstrual products. In addition, we are not the only country in the world, specifically on our continent, that has these issues. According to data collected in 2016, 95% of girls in Ghana occasionally miss school because of period poverty. In Uganda, 28% of girls are absent from school during their period according to data collected in 2019. And in 2022 it is recorded that around 7 million schoolgirls in South Africa struggle to access menstrual products. The consequences of period shaming are vast and dangerous for young girls and women alike, such as poor hygiene, urinary tract and vaginal infections, early pregnancy, HIV/AIDS and STD infections, and absenteeism from school and work. Period shaming is prevalent. It is a stumbling block to girls' education and dignity. [iStockphoto] Having to stay home because of the lack of access to menstrual products and proper hygiene facilities is one issue. Another issue is that Menstruation also comes with physical symptoms such as Dysmenorrhea (menstrual cramps), which can have debilitating effects on some women's health and well-being; occasionally indicating underlying physiological issues such as endometriosis, uterine fibroids, and pelvic inflammatory disease, to name a few. With this in mind, only 7 out of 195 countries in the world offer paid menstrual leave. This past month, Spain has become one of the first countries in Europe to grant women the right to three days of paid menstrual leave a month with the aim to advance reproductive and sexual rights. Other countries which have granted paid menstrual leave are Japan in 1947, Indonesia in 2003, South Korea in 1953, Taiwan in 2003, Vietnam in 2020, and in Zambia the 1990s. Education and work empower women towards independence and aid in our country's development, it is necessary to address period poverty and the presence of stigma and taboo in order to fight gender inequity. Sen. Gloria Orwoba's work to end period shaming is a step in the right direction. Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu has since announced that the ministry will supply more than one million schoolgirls with menstrual products to minimize absenteeism. It is simply not enough as much more needs to be done to put an end to period shaming and stigma. Good work for young girls and women has begun, but that work is only the beginning of addressing period poverty and the health consequences that women face every single day. It is time to put an end to period shaming and stigma through further preventative methods and policy-making that addresses: the distribution of free sanitary products all over the country, proper education on women's cycles to avoid poor hygiene, infections, and early pregnancy, and accommodating menstrual leave for working women once a month. - Ms. Ndimu is a student and an activist, and can be reached on valentinendimu@gmail.com

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