As we acknowledge World Population Day we can see that the pandemic is playing a huge part in severely affecting healthcare systems around the world. This is having an impact particularly on women and their access to sexual and reproductive heath services. It has also worsened the prevalence of sexual violence against women, child marriage and the practice of FGM. This affects a huge number of girls and women in the world.
By disempowering girls and women, there are damaging consequences to their life chances and choices, not just for them but for their children too. If we want to have healthy and happy future populations, then women need to have equality, be in charge of their own bodies and have access to good quality healthcare.
This starts with girls being able to manage their own period with dignity, by understanding menstruation, having period products and being able to go to school. It also means not having sex with men for money to buy pads.
In a small way, by providing girls with reusable period pads, we’re helping them start to maintain control over their bodies so they can go on to have healthy and productive lives and make informed choices about their sexual and reproductive health. This has to be good for our world population.