engleski

MEASURES FOR REDUCING PERIOD POVERTY AT WORKPLACE

The importance of menstrual health has been historically neglected, mainly due to taboos and misconceptions about menstruation and androcentrism within health knowledge and health systems around the world. The concept of androcentrism takes the male body as a reference for all people which in a health context leads to the invisibility of the female body and women’s health in health science, politics and practice. Consequently, the problem of "period poverty", which refers to financial, social, cultural and political barriers to access menstrual products and education, is systematically neglected. Results of scarce research on this subject indicate few key challenges people who menstruate face on their workplace: menstrual shame and embarrassment, social stigma ; unavailability of menstrual products and medications to reduce pain during menstruation, inability to maintain adequate menstrual hygiene at the workplace, absence from work due to menstrual pain and insufficient hygienic conditions. Since the promotion of menstrual health is key for achieving greater gender equality in the workplace and beyond, in this paper I will make recommendation on how to alleviate aforementioned challenges, i.e. to improve menstrual health and reduce menstrual poverty. The recommendations are created based on the results of previously conducted research on menstrual poverty in different countries and other recent research on economic and environmental impacts of menstrual products. These recommendation have several aims including raising the level of menstrual health education not only among people who menstruate but also people who do not menstruate, ensuring basic hygienic conditions and availability of menstrual products at the workplace, encouraging the use of reusable menstrual products to reduce negative environmental impact of disposable menstrual products and reducing the financial burden of menstrual products on the household budget.

period poverty, workplace, menstrual health

nije evidentirano