Report shows new public policies need a comprehensive look to solve menstrual poverty

This year, the President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, signed a decree that provides for the free distribution of pads to people who menstruate through the Unified Health System (SUS). The project is part of the Menstrual Dignity Program and intends to reach around 8 million people, also contemplating the transsexual population. With a budget of 418 million reais, the proposal aims, in addition to guaranteeing access to hygiene products, to promote gender equity and end menstrual poverty.

Mônica Maria de Jesus Silva, professor at USP’s Ribeirão Preto School of Nursing (EERP) and coordinator of the project “ MenstruAção : health education to face menstrual poverty”, explains that menstrual poverty involves social, cultural and political barriers for people who menstruate to have access to suitable products for hygiene.

Current scenario
It is also interesting to note that the issue involves access to infrastructure for basic hygienic care, such as piped water, sewage and private bathrooms. “Finally, menstrual poverty also encompasses the lack of information and knowledge about the menstrual cycle”, explains the specialist. Considering this scenario, since 2014, the United Nations (UN) has treated the issue as a matter of public health and human rights.


Monica Maria de Jesus Silva. Personal archive
“In Brazil, the debate about menstrual poverty is recent and historically neglected, so, despite the menstrual dignity being part of the lives of people with a uterus, this debate is still silenced, just as menstruation itself still is in our society”, says Mônica. Thus, the professor explains that the erasure of the issue led to the processing of public policies starting in Brazil only in 2021 — with the organization of a Bill , despite the issue being a historically observed problem in the country.

Mônica also adds that it is only in 2023 that an active program will be created for the issue, which aims to ensure the supply of pads by the SUS, focusing on the population living below the poverty line.

Fortunately, with the growth of the international commitment to the promotion of menstrual dignity, the theme has been gaining greater visibility in the public debate, with the participation of important actors, such as: researchers, civil society and the third sector. However, the teacher reflects that the scenario of menstrual poverty is still bleak in the world, therefore, about 12.8% of people who menstruate live in this situation. Furthermore, more than 1 billion people around the world do not have access to a safe toilet.

Brazil
According to a report made by the United Nations Population Fund with UNICEF, around 321,000 girls do not have toilets in conditions of use in their schools. In addition, of the 60 million people who menstruate in the country, 15 million do not have access to adequate menstrual hygiene products, that is, one in four people is unable to obtain sanitary napkins.

“When we talk about infrastructure, 17% of girls up to 19 years old do not have access to the general water distribution network and 4 million girls attend schools with deprivation of at least one basic factor for hygiene”, adds Mônica. Among the different factors, we can find the presence of piped water, soap for hand and body hygiene, basic sanitation and a place to dispose of the used menstrual product.

Based on these data, the expert explains that menstrual poverty is a socioeconomic, infrastructure and public health problem that affects cisgender girls and women, transgender boys and men and non-binary people, with greater effects on people living in vulnerable situations — both in rural and urban areas — also covering homeless people, the population deprived of liberty and refugees.

“Since it is impossible to acquire suitable products for menstrual hygiene, these people seek cheap alternatives, such as: the use of cloths, newspapers, toilet paper or breadcrumbs to contain menstrual blood”. Despite the alternatives presented being cheap, Mônica reflects that they can bring serious harm to both physical and mental health of individuals.

Public policy
It is possible to note that, today, Brazil has some public policies that demonstrate that the country has kicked off the search for a solution to the issue, but it is clear that there is still a long way to go. The professor reveals that “ the current programs to combat menstrual poverty still face obstacles to their implementation and also to their broad funding both at the state and federal levels”.

Considering that the lack of menstrual dignity is a multifactorial phenomenon, it is possible to understand that the improvement of the current scenario involves measures that must touch on different aspects of the issue. “In this sense, new public policies need a comprehensive look, which promotes access to menstrual hygiene items, however, it is necessary to understand that this is just the tip of the problem”, adds the specialist.

In this way, public policies must also reach the search for menstrual education, access to information, the guarantee of a quality health system, the expansion of sanitation networks, investment in schools and their infrastructure and the implementation of social programs that touch on the problem.