Approximately 1,168 secondary school girls in Region Seven on Tuesday received a one-year supply of sanitary napkins under First Lady Arya Ali’s Menstrual Hygiene initiative.
At a launch ceremony held at the Bartica Secondary School for the extension of the initiative to the region, Ali was reported as telling students that it was intended to end period poverty, which leads to school dropouts and many other issues.
“Last year, when I heard that girls were forced to drop out of school in Guyana because they did not have sanitary pads to use when experiencing their menstruation or their period my heart broke,’ she was quoted as saying by the Department of Public Information (DPI).
“At no point in your lives should you be forced to choose between having an education and staying home because you don’t have access to sanitary products,” she added.
Ali said the “life changing mission” will continue across the country to tackle the issue and bring comfort to young girls.
She was accompanied by Education Minister Priya Manickchand, who is partnering with her to distribute sanitary products to female students across the country.
According to the DPI report, Manickchand said period poverty is one of the issues that interferes with gender equality, since many opportunities are taken away from girls during their period.
“These are the small things that we don’t talk about that interfere with the equality the world is trying to achieve. If we have to take away five to seven, sometimes longer — because that’s what happens with our bodies and hormones behaving badly and so on — days from your life every month, then you don’t have the same opportunities to shine, to grow, to learn,” he said.
She also encouraged female students at the Bartica Secondary School to speak out about issues that affect them, especially menstrual poverty and health.
“Any effort to shine a light on the issue of menstruation and how we can provide for persons who can’t provide for themselves is a noble one,” Manickchand told students.
Meanwhile, the report said prior to her arrival, Manickchand distributed a number of packages to the Beach View Nursery and St. John the Baptist Nursery schools. The packages were intended to provide necessary school supplies to the nursery students to aid their educational development, DPI said.
