In her message on marking the Menstrual Hygiene Day today, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Country Representative to Sierra Leone, Nadia Rasheed has advocated for a Period Friendly World that advances dignity.
Speaking to AYV exclusively last evening, Nadia said: “Together we can advocate for a Period Friendly World that advances dignity, health and rights of all girls and women. Making menstruation a normal fact of life reduces exclusion and narrows social and economic inequalities. To end period poverty, we must ensure that all girls and women can manage menstruation with comfort and dignity.”
Every year, the Day is observed on May 28 to create awareness about the importance of good menstrual hygiene, reinstate the significance of access of menstrual products to all and break stigmas associated with menstruation.
Menstrual Hygiene Day aims to busts the myths and urge people to maintain hygiene to stay healthy. Poor menstrual hygiene can cause lot of health issues. As we gear up to celebrate Menstrual Hygiene Day for this year, here are a few reasons why we should always maintain good menstrual hygiene.
Lack of access to the appropriate menstrual products affects the fundamental right of girls and women to go to school and work. Ensuring good menstrual hygiene requires having safe, acceptable and reliable supplies to manage menstruation, privacy to change materials, facilities to safely and privately wash, and information to make informed choices.
Menstrual hygiene is a health as well as a human rights issue and a key aspect of women’s reproductive health, with 800 million people between the ages of 15 to 49 having their menstruation daily.
Tragically, an estimated 500 million people lack access to menstrual products and adequate facilities for menstrual health. More often than not, this results in exclusion, embarrassment and shame for women and girls, exacerbates social and economic barriers, and reinforces gender inequalities.
Adolescent girls were supported with hygiene kits containing menstrual hygiene products, and work sessions were held to brainstorm on how to address period poverty and stigma around menstruation in Sierra Leone.
The importance of supporting efforts to ease the burden on young girls was also stressed to the young men present, all of whom agreed to be period champions for the girls in their families and communities.
The UNFPA is aimed at achieving the goal of keeping adolescent girls in school by providing them with sanitary pads, increasing knowledge on hygienic practices during menstruation, and increasing advocacy for addressing socio-economic factors that hinder girls’ access to affordable menstrual hygiene and sanitation products.
UNFPA is the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency ensuring rights and choices for all.
In another engagement, Samester Hannah Kargbo, Executive Director of the Girls Advocacy Development Network said menstrual health is a right and reaffirmed that all girls and women must enjoy dignity and freedom from discrimination.
Sanitary pads come in multiple covers because unclean sanitary napkins can lead to urinary infections, fungal infections and reproductive tract infections. It can also make women prone to infertility.
The body becomes prone to rashes and vaginal yeast infections when women do not change their sanitary napkins every 6-8 hours. Wearing a pad for too long can be harmful.
When people do not wash their hands with soap after changing sanitary napkins, it can lead to yeast infections or Hepatitis B. Simultaneously, it is important to wash hands before changing sanitary napkins as well.
When people are menstruating, they often may wash themselves from back to front in a hurry. This is extremely harmful as it leads to the bacteria from the bowel moving to the vagina, leading to infections. They should always be careful to wash from front to back.
