Menstrual Hygiene
Menstrual Health and Hygiene
“बूंद पे बात”
A large number of women of communities across India are still not aware about issues related to menstruation and maintaining personal hygiene during the period and dealing with associated physical problems. Periods become a reason for the exclusion for them from most social, domestic, religious and educational activities. They began to believe that this natural process occurring in their bodies makes them dirty and thus anything to do with their periods becomes dirty or ‘unspeakable’. This is why women and adolescent girls often feel uncomfortable discussing their menstrual issues, which might prove to be dangerous in some cases - as they may be suffering from an infection, cysts etc.
Various stakeholders, including the NITI Aayog, observed May 28 as Menstrual Hygiene Day to highlight the importance of good menstrual hygiene management, but the women who are residing in the slums are less aware about menstruation. Our Menstrual Hygiene Awareness Program focuses on encouraging hygienic practices during menstruation, dispelling common myths and misconceptions associated with periods and enabling girls to speak about menstrual issues without inhibition.
What we do
Access to sanitary products, safe and hygienic spaces in which to use them, and the right to manage menstruation in a dignified manner is a fundamental need of women and girls everywhere. Hope On Foundation (HOF) takes the responsibility to change this backward mind-set of the society as well as to break the ice by abridging the gap of knowledge through awareness. We are running a campaign “बूंद पे बात” across India and through our awareness activity highlights the importance of good menstrual hygienic practices such as the use of sanitary napkins; washing and cleaning; napkins disposal and precautions that should be taken during the periods with eating habits which enable healthy reproductive life in future. They usually don’t get a proper platform to get information or discuss such issues.This kind of awareness programme helped them to understand what is menstruation, calculation of the period, physical problems faced by women during their periods and ways to deal with it, maintaining personal hygiene during this period and importance of maintaining hygiene, avoiding the traditional methods of using dirty cloths and promoting use of sanitary napkins, etc. Traditional myths and misconceptions in rural areas related to menstruation were discussed.
Later in the end we distributed the kit which contained 1 towel, 2 undergarments, 8 pads, 1 Tooth-Paste, 1 Mask & Sanitizer, 1 Soaps along with that we distributed our Hope on Foundation Advocacy pamphlets in Hindi for better understanding.
Menstrual Health and Hygiene awareness programmes 12,000+ Beneficiaries
States : 3 States/Cities
Communities : 30+ States/Cities
NGOs/CSOs : 300+ PAN
India Amenities : 12000+
Sanitary Pads Distributed