PERIOD POVERTY: “WOULD THIS HAPPEN TO A MAN?” BY LINDSEY WILKINSON DESIGN ELLA SMYTH [84]
Period poverty is defined as inadequate access to menstrual products, education, hygiene facilities, waste management or some sort of combination. Current data suggests the average person who menstruates spends an average of $2,000 on menstrual products in their lifetime, according to Global Citizen. Globally, this phenomenon affects over 500 million people, according to BMC Women’s Health in 2021. While this topic has mainly been researched abroad in developing nations, there are an estimated 16.9 million people who menstruate living in poverty in the U.S., according to Medical News Today in 2021. Anne Sebert Kuhlmann, associate professor of behavioral science and health education in the College for Public Health and Social Justice at St. Louis University and a Director of the Master of Public Health program, is a researcher who has always worked in maternal reproductive health. Kuhlmann was introduced to period insecurity by Dignity Period, a nonprofit organization that keeps girls in school by ensuring they have access to quality menstrual hygiene products and education and has served on the board since 2018. Dignity Period exclusively worked in <strong>No</strong>rthern Ethiopia until Kuhlmann started her research in St. Louis in 2019. “We realized that there was a decent amount of attention to this issue in lowerincome countries like Ethiopia, Uganda, Nepal, but there was almost no discussion of it in places like the United States or other high-income countries,” said Kuhlmann. “That really planted a seed in the back of our head, like wait a second. If people are struggling to get by, struggling to meet their basic needs, they may very well be struggling with this.” After receiving funding, Kuhlmann started her research in the St. Louis area, partnering with 10 community service organizations, such as food pantries, job training centers and day shelters. 64% of the women surveyed indicated that they experienced period poverty in the past year, and 20% of the women indicated that they experienced period poverty every month. Comparatively, in St. Louis, 21.8% or one in five people live in poverty, according to the U.S. census. For many experiencing period poverty, it is a situation plagued by a lack of information, education and resources which leads many to struggle in silence. This impacts school attendance, health and quality of life. “It really affects your dignity, your sense of self-worth, your ability to care for yourself,” said Kuhlmann. “Imagine this: you only have one pair of underwear, and you’re making makeshift pads and homemade tampons, but then they get stained. How does that make you feel? You’ve got dirty, soiled underwear, and you’re walking around with nothing to do about it.” Kuhlmann said when people rely on homemade products and stretch out the duration of use, it leads to an increased risk of urinary tract infections and vaginal infections. While there is little data in the U.S., a case study published in the Global Journal of Health Science found that 65.7% of schoolgirls in India who used homemade menstrual products reported urogenital infections compared to 12.3% of those using sanitary pads. While Kuhlmann’s study emphasized the inability of many women to access products, there is a larger conversation that many in this field said needs to happen. “It’s rooted in misogyny,” said Elizabeth Lester, student engagement coordinator at The University of Alabama’s Women and Gender Resource Center. “People are like, ‘I’m not misogynistic,’ but then don’t mind when [someone’s] daughter has to miss school for a week because of her period.” Seven students at Bronx Prep Middle School in New York decided to change their school’s culture regarding menstruation. After polling classmates, they found that 67% of female students said “they feel uncomfortable discussing their periods at school because it’s not anybody’s business” and 33% of students said “periods were a dirty topic.” By talking about the stigma surrounding menstruation, these girls were able to get people nationwide to start having conversations about menstruation, and “Sssh! Periods” became the first-ever grand prize winner in the NPR Student Podcast Challenge. While the conversation is changing at Bronx Prep Middle School, other school districts are still perpetuating the stigma. Commissioned by Thinx and PERIOD, a nationwide study found that 84% of students in the US have either missed class time or know someone who has due to a lack of access to period products, and one in five teens struggled to purchase period products or were not able to purchase them at all. Some school districts and states, on the other hand, are fighting for their menstruating students. In Ann Arbor, Michigan, a law was passed to stock all public toilets with menstrual products. On May 17, 2021, Alabama passed a law in which feminine hygiene products would be available at no cost to students upon request. The bill cited recent efforts by two 13-year-old Montgomery students, Brooke Bennett and Breanna Bennett. The twin sisters founded Women In Training as a nonprofit to provide menstrual products to those unable to afford them. Stephanie McClure, assistant professor of anthropology at The University of Alabama, previously worked with Kuhlmann at St. Louis University and is now partnering up with her to get more data in the south. “We got back in touch because I was using [Kuhlmann’s] articles in the classes I was teaching on health inequities, and we started talking about maybe duplicating some of the work she had done down here,” said McClure. “We want to be able to compare the situations and needs so that we can both increase awareness of this issue and contribute to the policy action that is taking place.” Currently, there are 27 states that continue to tax menstrual products. These states consider menstrual products to be “luxury” items and not a need. In Alabama, the combined state and local rate is 9.22%, which would generate $5.4 million in revenue, according to Period Equity. States profit off of menstruation, and when they eliminate the period tax, they lose millions. According to Global Citizen, when California eliminated taxes on diapers and menstrual products, they lost about $55 million in revenue per year. “You always have to ask yourself, ‘Would this happen to a man?’” said Lester. “Would there ever be a bodily activity that a man would have once a month that would keep him from doing things that would not be then catered to him?” [85]
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