Shifting Focus: From Toilets to Menstrual Hygiene – For the Health of India’s Women

Whilst the Swachh Bharat Mission did a lot to deliver the situation of open defecation to the forefront of dialog and motion in India  – efficiently constructing over 10 crore bogs throughout the nation – there stays a lot to be executed in phrases of sanitation for girls on the topic of menstrual hygiene.

Despite the scale at which it occurs (there are round 355 million menstruating ladies and ladies in India), menstruation stays a taboo topic – shrouded in secrecy and largely suppressed by silence and disgrace. This leads to an absence of dialogue on the topic at particular person, household and group ranges.

Pearl Tiwari, Director and CEO, Ambuja Foundation, says, “Many rural women lack access to sanitary napkins due to financial constraints, lack of awareness, and a lack of product availability. With approximately 50% of women using cloth during menstruation, and with almost 20 million girls dropping out of school every year, due to lack of hygiene, separate toilets and availability of sanitary napkins – menstrual hygiene for women and girls is clearly the need of the hour when it comes to sanitation in India.” 

Tiwari believes there’s a want for a widespread, 4 pronged strategy to deal with this delicate situation as soon as and for all, and to elevate the bar on menstrual hygiene:

1. Access to KnowledgeThere is a necessity to present each ladies and ladies with entry to data on the situation.  Here, grassroots well being employees have an important function to play in spreading consciousness about the human anatomy, the reproductive system, the menstrual course of, acceptable hygiene and modifications going down in the pubertal section.
2. Access to Menstrual ProductsEven with ample consciousness, discovering sanitary pads and napkins will be usually troublesome, and costly. With the stigma surrounding sanitary napkins, ladies additionally discover it difficult to point out its want to the males in the family. Market unavailability has precipitated many extra ladies to use fabric napkins – the National Family Health Survey highlights the reality that fifty% of ladies and ladies proceed to use fabric napkins – which leads to elevated probabilities of an infection.
3. Access to MHM & WASHSchools in villages usually lack services for altering and disposing sanitary napkins. This consists of gender-specific bogs, clear water and cleaning soap, and clear altering locations. Consequently, many women on this age group drop out of college. There is a necessity for rural well being employees and NGOs to work with faculties in distant places to present clear and hygienic infrastructure for managing menstrual hygiene.
4. Access to Safe Disposal of Used absorbentsWith little to no consciousness about safely disposing them, sanitary napkins are sometimes disposed in sewage traces, open pits, and commodes. Here, behaviour change by way of consciousness about wrapping and discarding used sanitary napkins, and the appropriate strategies of disposal, together with the provision of disposal machines, is required to enable for secure and hygienic disposal of Sanitary Napkins – together with specifically designed assortment luggage or incinerators needs to be put in in faculties for disposal.  Moreover, there’s a determined want for exploration round bio-degradable, however price efficient, sanitary pads to circumvent the mounting waste disposal downside being generated by business sanitary napkins in the market.

Menstrual hygiene in India should be elevated into the mainstream dialogue. We, as a rustic, should deliver the situation of Menstrual Hygiene Management out from the shadows, and take complete, holistic motion to deal with points round it, to guarantee the well being of our ladies and ladies – at the moment and for the future.