History of Periods.
Historical aspects include the story of the access to feminine hygiene products and menstrual education over time in Kenya.
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Evidence indicates that history of menstruation in Kenya involves:
Social Stigmas surrounding menses
How the issue has developed
Have periods always been written off as a negative experience?
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When did a natural, biological cycle start to become taboo?
Medium is a corporation that published an article promoting the debunking of period taboos and stigmas. In the article it explains that this taboo or avoidance of talking about periods stems farther than the 20th century, stating that it has been documented in religious texts such as the Bible and the Quran. Stigmas were even published in the first Latin encyclopedia circa , and ancient Egyptian medical texts like the famous Kahun Gynecological papyrus and the papyrus Ebers. Read the full article for more.
How Kenya has led the movement
This article describes the steps Kenya has taken to not only raise awareness of menstrual health, but to change the conversation from taboo to celebration. In order to do this, Kenya has removed the luxury tax on tampons and pads, and included free MHM product distribution in the national budget.
LunaPads
WASH united, the initiator of Menstrual Hygiene Day in Kenya, which you can learn more about here:
WASH United has taken incredible strides in partnership with the Kenyan government to enact policies regarding menstrual hygiene management (MHM). The following article goes on to illustrate specific examples and lay out a plan for the future of MHM in Kenya and globally.
LunaPads
HuffPost 2017
June 21, 2017: The President of Kenya signed the Basic Education Amendment Act into law, which commits the government to providing “free, sufficient and quality” sanitary pads to girls in state schools. This is a monumental step as it demands girls receive a quality education and avoid other human rights violations such as child marriages. Giving free pads to girls will relieve families of financial stress and promote girls to pursue higher education, leading to a successful well-paying job in the future.
Read more about Menstrual Hygiene Management and how different groups have tackled this issue to promote reproductive education and dissassemble age-old myths regarding menstruation.
Plan International has been following MHM issues very closely and reporting on the latest updates. Their mission is to help meet the 2030 SDG goals, and thus far have reached over 70 countries and helped 15 million boys and 17 million girls in a wide variety of ways. Plan International does not focus solely on menstrual health, but has helped reached children and their communities to overcome adversities and struggles.
Aeon takes its readers back in time to some of the earliest mentions of period stigmas. One such mention comes to us from 79 CE, when a man wrote that all manners of animals and insects would drop dead from being touched by a menstruating woman, that linen would turn black, and razors would dull. Coincidentally, he also said drinking a gladiator's blood would cure epilepsy.
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This article contains a 20 minute podcast talking about the history of periods in a deeper manner.
Delve Deeper
Shown above is a cave drawing found in western Australia which archeologists think depicts two women dancing while menstruating.
Medical Daily 2016
Comedic informational video of a 1920's policy concerning buying sanitary pads.
"A Brief History of the Menstrual Period" goes through each decade and describes different MHM methods all the way up to modern times and in 3rd world countries.
Another article describing the history of certain products, and debunking historical myths like burning a toad to ease a heavy flow, or that period blood could cure leprosy.
Disney's vintage menstruation informational video