Provide free sanitary towels to end stigma and period poverty

I wish to congratulate Senator Gloria Orwaba for her efforts in demystifying women’s monthly period and for advocating free sanitary pads for the disadvantaged. She sat through a Senate session in menstrual blood-stained clothes, until her colleagues asked the Speaker to eject her for supposedly violating the House “dress code”.

She brought out the message very clearly, boldly and powerfully, striking a major blow against period stigma and, ultimately, period poverty.

More than half of women and girls in Kenya cannot afford monthly menstrual products, with almost 20 per cent turning to homemade options such as toilet paper, pieces of cloth or mattresses. Inflation has seen the cost of pads nearly double this year, putting feminine hygiene products further out of reach.

Hygiene products

A petition calling for lower prices was launched by Dial a Pad, an NGO promoting access to feminine hygiene products in Africa. The organisation has collected more than 4,000 signatures.

In the late 80s and 90s, women could not openly talk about sanitary towels. 

That was a conversation for mothers and their daughters. Girls in mixed schools would wait for their classmates to leave the class for them to check the conditions of their garments.

Some girls were banished from school until the end of their menses. Mercifully, the Competency-Based Curriculum has Home Science as a subject that is taught to all students.

Thanks to activists such as Senator Orwoba, fathers will add sanitary towels to the family shopping budgets. It is also high time all institutions provided disposal bins.

In 2019, a 14-year-old girl died by suicide after a teacher reportedly shamed her for staining her uniform during her first period. Stigma pushes many girls to skip school when menstruating.

Kenya scrapped taxes on period products in 2004 and in 2017 introduced a law requiring the government to provide them free of charge to schoolgirls. However, only a small percentage of girls benefitted.

The government should reinstate the free sanitary towels for schools. Civil society should also step in to assist the girls. An educated woman is a blessing to the whole community.

Ms Onjoro is CEO, Career Organisation; [email protected]