Local organizations are collaborating to supply menstrual hygiene products for low-income women and girls in the region, through the St. Louis Alliance for Period Supplies. One, the St. Louis Area Diaper Bank, has been supplying free diapers for infants and toddlers for families in need throughout the area since 2014.
Jessica Adams, founder and executive director of the St. Louis Area Diaper Bank, said the new effort is “a network similar to the diaper distribution network, whose purpose is to distribute menstrual hygiene products to low-income women and girls throughout the St. Louis region.”
Dignity Period, a charitable organization based out of St. Louis that supplies reusable menstrual pads to women and girls in Ethiopia, is bringing the concept home through this alliance.
“We wanted to be able to contribute and do some work in our own backyard,” said Angie Wiseman, executive director of Dignity Period.
Wiseman said Cotton Babies, another local business, makes the reusable pads that will be in the period supply kit in St. Louis.
“Since this is kind of a pilot project, we want to gauge the community reaction to reusable products,” Wiseman said. “We’re putting together packets of two reusable pads, along with detergent included and care instructions, just to kind of get women started as far as being comfortable with the concept of reusable products.”
Women without access to menstrual supplies are making due with less than adequate period protection – fabric rags, paper towels, or even diapers needed to keep babies clean and dry. Having adequate menstrual supplies reduces the risk of infection.
“Two pads are probably not necessarily going to cover a woman’s needs during her period, but if she’s able to supplement and perhaps use these as nighttime coverage, that cuts her need for supplies in half, potentially,” Wiseman said.
Research by Anne Sebert Kuhlmann and co-authors from the College of Public Health and Social Justice at Saint Louis University reveal the need to provide sanitary products for low-income women and girls in the St. Louis area due to the high cost of products. Kuhlmann is an associate professor of behavioral science and health education at SLU and a Dignity Period board member.
Their study found that nearly two-thirds of the women surveyed were unable to afford menstrual hygiene supplies like pads or tampons at some point during the previous year, and 21 percent of women lacked supplies on a monthly basis. Nearly half – 46 percent – of those surveyed could not afford to buy both food and period-related products during the past year. Additionally, 36 percent of the surveyed women who reported being employed part- or full-time had missed one or more days of work per month due to their periods.
While lack of access to menstrual hygiene products can result in negative health issues, including infection and poor quality-of-life, Kuhlmann points to the need for broader education and policy shifts surrounding menstrual and women’s health.
“Adequate menstrual hygiene management is not a luxury,” Kuhlmann and her co-authors conclude in the study. “It is a basic need for all women and should be regarded as a basic woman’s right. Our failure to meet these biological needs for all women in the United States is an affront to their dignity and barrier to their full participation in the social and economic life of our country. ”
The alliance will also offer disposable products for women and girls to use during their period, Adams said, through U by Kotex.
“Primarily, our distribution will be disposable,” Adams said. “We’re a member of the National Alliance for Period Supplies, which is sponsored by Kotex, a Kimberly Clark brand.” They get Huggies brand diapers from Kimberly Clark, and Adams said their U by Kotex Brand is sponsoring the National Alliance of Period Supplies. Last year, the bank received 200,000 pads and panty liners from U by Kotex. “So we have those that will be ready to start distributing to partner agencies in the spring,” Adams said.
Adams said they will soon accept applications for potential donation sites, and the alliance expects to begin distributing menstrual period supplies in the spring.
Incarcerated women represent another group of women and girls in need of access to menstrual supplies. Adams said the alliance is working to meet that need as well.
“We are actively engaged on a local and state level with policy work that would provide for menstrual supplies to incarcerated women at the municipal level and at the state level,” Adams said.
On the local level, she said Ald. Christine Ingrassia has been working on the issue, and at the state level state Senator Jill Schupp and state Rep. Tracy McCreery “are two of the most outstanding and outspoken advocates for access for menstrual supplies.”
You can find the St. Louis Alliance for Period Supplies on Facebook or visit stldiaperbank.org. For more information about Dignity Period, email info@dignityperiod.org, call 314-356-4129 or visit dignity period.org.
